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BRITISH      TREATIES 


OF 


1871  &  1874. 


LETTERS 


TO  THE 


PEESIDENT  OF  THE  UJSTITED  STATES: 


BY 


H.  C.  CAREY. 


PHILADELPHIA: 
COLLTi^S,  PRIIN-TER,  705   JAY]N"E  STREET. 

1874. 


0 


I 


« I    •  «.  »  , 


•^fc»»   •      ••••••    • 


TO  THE  PRESIDENT  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES. 


Mr.  President: — 

The  Senate  having  postponed  action  upon  the  Treaty  submitted 
for  confirmation  just  previous  to  the  adjournment  of  Congress,  and 
the  public  press  having  fortunately  caused  removal  of  the  seal  of 
secrecy  to  which  it  had  been  subjected,  opportunity  has  been  thus 
afforded  for  public  examination  of  the  question  of  our  relations 
with  the  British  provinces,  and  to  that  end  I  venture  to  invite  your 
attention  to  the  brief  statement  of  facts  which  will  now  be  given, 
as  follows : — 

Somewhat  more  than  four  years  since,  in  June,  1870,  the  two 
houses  of  Congress  by  a  joint  resolution  instructed  the  Secretary 
of  the  Treasury  to  appoint  a  special  agent  charged  with  inquiring 
into  "  the  extent  and  state  of  the  trade  between  the  United  States 
and  the  several  dependencies  of  Great  Britain  in  North  America;" 
and  in  conformity  therewith  that  officer  selected  for  the  perform- 
ance of  a  duty  so  important  Mr.  J.  N.  Larned,  a  gentleman  who 
appears,  by  his  report  of  Jan.  28, 1871,  now  before  me,  to  have  been 
actuated  by  no  feeling  other  than  that  of  a  sincere  desire  to  obtain 
for  himself,  and  for  public  use,  an  accurate  idea  of  the  effects  which 
had  resulted  from  the  adoption  of  reciprocity,  so  called,  in  1854, 
and  from  its  repudiation  in  1865,  in  compliance  with  an  almost 
unanimous  demand  to  that  effect,  at  the  close  of  the  first  decade 
of  its  existence. 

To  some  of  the  facts  thus  obtained  and  reported  it  is  that  I  now, 
Mr.  President,  invite  your  attention,  as  follows: — 

In  the  last  year  of  the  previous  system,  1854,  as  therein  is  shown, 
the  imports  frpm  Canada  amounted,  in  round  numbers,  to  $6,700,000, 
our  exports  meanwhile  somewhat  exceeding  $15,300,000,  the  bal- 
ance being  favorable  to  the  Union  to  the  extent  of  $8,600,000.  In 
the  last  of  the  Treaty  years,  to  wit,  in  1866,  the  six  millions  of  im- 
ports in  1854  had  grown  to  forty-six  millions,  our  fifteen  millions 
of  exports  of  this  latter  year  having  remained  throughout  almost 
entirely  unchanged,  and  the  balance  having  become  adverse  to  the 
extent  of  more  than  thirty  millions ;  thereby  enabling  our  northern 
neighbors  to  profit  to  that  large  amount  by  selling  in  the  dearest 
markets,  and  applying  the  proceeds  to  purchasing  in  the  cheapest 
ones. 

M186262 


Extending  the  field  of  observation  so  as  to  embrace  all  the 
provinces  now  included  in  the  Dominion,  we  obtain,  for  the  four 
last  of  the  treaty  years,  the  results  here  given  as  follows : — 


Exports. 

Imports. 

Balance. 

1863  .     . 

1864  .     . 

1865  .     . 

1866  .     . 

.     .     $28,620,000 
.     .       26,567,000 
.     .       28,862,000 
.     .      25,521,000 

$24,621,000 
38,922,000 
36,176.000 
53,387,000 

$4,599,000 

12,353,0*00 

7,314,000 

27,866,060 

favorable, 
unfavorable. 

(I 

We  see,  thus,  that  the  Dominion  market  for  our  products  actually 
declined;  that  here  furnished  for  Dominion  products  having  mean- 
time more  than  doubled. 

The  years  1869  and  1870,  reciprocity  having  ceased,  still  ex- 
hibited adverse  balances,  greatly  less  adverse,  however,  than  had 
been  that  of  1866 :  those  of  the  two  years  combined  having  been 
but  §33,000,000.  [Since  then,  as  shown  by  the  British  Commis- 
sioners themselves,  the  movement  thus  described  has  been  continued, 
and  with  such  effect  that  the  adverse  balances  of  the  three  past 
years  combined  have  but  little  exceeded  $16,000,000,  little  more 
than  half  that  of  the  last  year  of  the  Treaty,  or  of  the  two  more 
recent  years,  1869  and  1870].* 

Commenting  upon  the  unsatisfactoriness  of  this  state  of  trade, 
the  special  agent  is  led  to  study  the  causes  of  its  existence,  and 
finally,  to  an  inquiry  as  to  the  process  by  means  of  which  they 
may  be  remedied,  with  the  result  which  will  be  now  exhibited,  as 
follows : — 

*'  It  appears,  therefore,  that  an  intimate  freedom  of  commerce  between  this 
country  and  its  northern  neighbors,  which  is  so  desirable  for  both  parties,  cannot 
be  contemplated  except  in  connection  with  a  material  chang-e  in  the  conditions  of 
the  foreign  relationship  that  the  provinces  sustain  towards  us.  It  involves,  of 
necessity,  an  entire  identification  of  the  material  interests  of  the  two  countries, 
by  their  common  association  in  some  form  or  other.  If  the  provinces  do  not 
choose  to  become  one  with  us  politically,  they  must,  at  least,  become  one  with  us 
cornraercially,  before  the  barriers  are  thrown  down  which  shut  them  out  from  an 
equal  participation  with  us  in  the  energetic  working  of  the  mixed  activities  of  the 
New  World,  and  which  deprive  us  in  a  great  measure  of  the  reinforcement  that 
they  are  capable  of  bringing  to  those  activities.  The  alternative  of  annexation  is 
the  ZoUverein,  or  a  customs  union,  after  the  plan  of  that  under  which  the  German 
states  secured  free  trade  among  themselves  and  identity  of  interest  in  their  com- 
merce with  the  outside  world.     *     *     ■'^     * 

"  There  does  exist  a  feeling  in  the  United  States  with  reference  to  them  which 
it  ought  not  to  be  difficult  for  the  people  of  the  provinces  to  understand.  It  is  the 
unwillingness  of  a  reasonable  jealousy,  and  of  a  just  prudential  selfishness,  to  ex- 
tend the  material  benefits  of  membership  in  the  American  Union,  without  its  re- 
sponsibilities and  reciprocal  obligations,  to  communities  with  which  the  certain 
relations  of  an  independent  friendship  cannot  be  cultivated  or  maintained ;  which 
are  controlled  by  a  distant  foreign  power,  and  which  are  at  all  times  liable  to  be 


*  Believing  the  import  entries  in  all  cases  to  be  those  most  likely  to  be  correct,  the 
special  agent  gives  them  as  obtained  from  both  sides  of  the  line.  What  has  been  the 
course  adopted  by  the  British  Commissioners  is  not  known,  and  it  is  for  that  reason 
difficult  to  account  for  the  fact,  among  others,  that  while  tlie  American  account  of  im- 
ports and  exports  for  1872-3  exhibits  an  unfavorable  balance  exceeding  $10,000,000, 
that  of  the  Commissioners  gives  one  of  little  more  than  half  of  that  amount. 


placed  in  an  attitude  of  unfriendliness  or  hostility  to  this  country  by  causes  outside 
of  themselves,  or  through  events  in  connection  with  which  they  have  nothing  on 
their  own  part  to  do.  Between  two  equally  independent  and  responsible  nationali- 
ties, homogeneous  in  blood  and  character,  and  with  every  interest  in  common,  situ- 
ated as  the  United  States  and  their  northern  neighbors  are  toward  each  other,  it 
would  be  as  easy  to  settle  the  relations  of  intimate  fellowship  upon  an  enduring 
basis,  as  it  is  made  difficult  to  do  so  in  the  case  of  these  provinces  by  reason  of 
their  dependent  states. 

"  The  circumstances  which  make  the  common  boundary  of  the  two  countries  an 
actual  barrier  instead  of  an  imaginary  line,  are  under  their  control,  not  ours.  It 
is  for  them  to  determine  which  affects  them  most  importantly,  their  political  asso- 
ciation with  Great  Britain,  or  their  commercial  and  industrial  association  in  inter- 
est with  the  United  States,  and  which  shall  be  yielded  to  the  other,  since  the  two 
are  unquestionably  in  conflict.  There  is  no  apparent  evasion  of  that  choice  that 
they  must  make." 

The  Treaty  of  Washington  now  closely  followed  this  Eeport, 
providing  for  the  settlement  of  various  questions  between  the 
United  States  and  Canada,  but  wholly  excluding  from  consideration 
that  of  ''Reciprocity,"  which  but  recently  had  been  so  fiercely 
agitated.  To  all  appearance  this  last  had  been  settled  by  the  Special 
Agent's  Eeport.  Peace,  so  far  as  that  question  was  concerned, 
prevailed,  and  continued  to  prevail  until  May  last,  when  through- 
out a  fortnight  or  more  there  was  emitted  from  the  "Reciprocity" 
Bureau  which  had  then  found  place  in  an  obscure  corner  of  the 
Treasury  Department,  a  series  of  literary  fireworks  the  like  of 
which  until  then  had  not  been  known  in  connection  with  our 
diplomatic  arrangements.  Assuming  generally  the  form  of  edi- 
torials, readers  were  to  be  by  them  awakened  to  the  fact,  till  then 
wholly  unperceived,  that  in  ceasing  to  grant  to  strangers  advan- 
tages that  would  have  been  unhesitatingly  refused  to  any  of  them- 
selves, they  had  been  guilty  of  "a  spiteful  mistake;"  and  that  "the 
popular  judgment"  now  appeared  to  be  on  the  side  of  a  renewal  of 
that  policy  by  means  of  which  Canadian  farmers  had,  throughout 
a  whole  decade,  been  allowed  to  sell  their  produce  at  the  high  prices 
prevailing  here  as  a  consequence  of  the  building  of  furnaces,  fac- 
tories, and  rolling-mills,  while  purchasing  their  ploughs  and  their 
harrows  at  the  lower  prices  prevailing  in  British  markets,  conse- 
quent upon  that  American  competition  which,  by  means  of  a  protec- 
tive tariff,  had  been  established.  The  public  opinion  thus  manufac- 
tured, and  intended  for  operation  on  senatorial  minds,  coming  next 
to  be  gathered  together,  it  stands  now  before  me,  forming  as  large  a 
collection  as  perhaps  was  ever  made  of  variations  of  a  single  tune, 
evolved  from  a  single  mind,  and  apparently  given  to  the  world  by 
aid  of  scarcely  more  than  a  single  pen. 

Little  more,  Mr.  President,  than  a  fortnight  later  the  public  mind 
is  found  to  have  been  startled  by  announcement  of  the  fact  of  a 
Treaty  being  "now  before  the  Senate"  having  for  its  object  that  of  car- 
rying into  practical  effect  the^r^^^zcopzmoTz  which  so  skilfully  had  been 
manufactured;  and  now  it  is  that  we  arrive  at  a  course  of  diplomatic 
operation  wholly  unprecedented,  to  wit,  that  of  sending  to  the  Senate 


an  elaborate  argument,  on  the  part  of  the  British  and  Canadian 
Commissioners,  in  favor  of  a  renewal  of  the  but-lately-so-universally- 
condemned  commercial  policy,  unaccompanied  by  even  a  single 
word  from  the  State  Department  to  the  effect  that  an  absolute 
refutation  of  most  of  what  was  therein  presented  would  be  found 
in  a  document  furnished  to  the  Senate  in  January,  1871;  and  that 
so  conclusive  had  been  regarded  the  Report  then  made  that  the 
question  had,  as  I  believe,  never  even  been  brought  before  the 
Congress  by  which  the  Washington  Treaty  had  been  negotiated. 

Marked  "confidential,"  and  thus  prevented  from  appearance  be- 
fore the  public  eye,  this  plausible  argument  was  meant  to  remain 
unanswered,  and  it  may  well  be  doubted  if  even  a  dozen  copies 
have  ever  been  seen  outside  of  the  senatorial  body.  With  much 
difficulty,  and  after  weeks  of  effort,  I  myself  succeeded  in  obtaining 
one,  to  a  single  passage  from  which  I  shall,  Mr.  President,  invite 
your  attention  in  another  letter,  with  a  view  to  enabling  you  to 
form  an  idea  of  its  general  character,  giving,  however,  in  advance 
a  brief  statement  of  real  facts  derived  from  authorities  that  cannot 
at  all  be  questioned;  meanwhile  remaining, 

Yery  truly  and  respectfully  yours, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 

November  18, 1874. 


LETTER    SECOND. 

Mk.  Peesident  : — 

The  subject-matter  of  the  passage  above  referred  to  is  that  of  the 
communication  of  the  Canadas  with  the  outside  world  throughout 
the  many  months  when  the  St.  Lawrence  is  closed  by  ice  or  fog, 
or  by  both  combined.  For  nearly  thirty  years  past  they  have  been 
allowed  the  privilege  of  free  passage  for  men  and  things  through 
the  territory  of  the  Union,  and  to  how  serious  an  extent  their  very 
existence  has  been  dependent  upon  continuance  of  that  grant  will 
now  be  shown,  as  follows: — 

By  the  census  of  1839,  Upper  Canada,  now  Ontario,  was  shown 
to  have  a  population  but  slightly  exceeding  400,000  souls.  Six 
years  later  Congress  granted  to  it,  and  to  its  sister  colonies,  the  free 
right  of  way  above  referred  to,  and  from  that  time  forward — further 
aided  by  reciprocity,  so  called,  granted  in  1854 — the  growth  of  num- 
bers was  so  rapid  that  in  1861  the  population  amounted  to  almost 
1,400,000,  or  nearly  three  and  a  half  times  more  than  it  had  been 
twenty-two  years  before. 

With  the  slightest  possible  exception,  from  the  date  of  the  grant 
above  referred  to,  the  British  free-trade  policy  had  been  that  of  the 
American  Union,  and  with  such   effect,  as  regarded  immigration, 


that  in  the  closing  year  of  the  period  above  described  it  had  fallen 
to  but  a  single  hundred  thousand ;  or  little  more  than  a  third  of  the 
number  at  which  it  had  stood  a  dozen  years  before,  when  that 
policy  had  but  begun  to  produce  its  natural  effect  in  closing  mills, 
mines,  and  factories  throughout  the  Union.  With  1861  there  came, 
however,  a  total  change,  making  such  demand  for  labor  in  the  field, 
the  factory,  the  furnace,  and  the  mine,  that  with  each  successive 
year  the  attractive  force  of  the  Union  increased,  with  such  diminu- 
tion in  the  power  of  the  Canadas  to  retain  even  their  home-grown 
population  that  the  total  increase  of  the  decade  ending  in  1871  was 
but  little  in  excess  of  300,000,  or  about  12J  per  cent  * 

Such  having  been  the  sad  state  of  things  resulting  from  abolition 
of  privileges  in  our  markets  granted  under  the  name  of  "  reci- 
procity," where  reciprocity  had  really  had  no  existence,  there 
occurred,  most  surprisingly,  to  Canadian  statesmen,  the  "happy 
thought,"  described  in  a  passage  from  the  Toronto  correspondent 
of  the  New  York  Tribune^  which  reads  as  follows: — 

"  The  amount  of  compensation  to  be  paid  to  Canada  by  the  United  States  for 
the  lease  of  the  in-shore  fisheries  was,  according  to  the  Treaty  of  Washington,  to 
be  determined  by  a  commission.  The  data  upon  which  to  determine  their  value, 
however,  were  so  uncertain,  and  the  difficulties  in  the  way  of  arriving  at  a  solution 
of  the  point  were  seen  to  be  so  great,  that  the  happy  thought  occurred  to  the 
Government  to  combine  an  abandonment  of  this  claim  with  the  positive  obliga- 
tions in  connection  with  the  canals  in  order  to  induce  the  United  States  to  renew 
reciprocal  relations  with  Canada.  There  can  be  little  doubt  that  these  reasons, 
combined  with  the  desire  on  the  part  of  Canada  for  a  renewal  of  reciprocity, 
constitute  the  determining  cause  for  her  taking  the  initiative  in  the  matter." 

How  insignificant,  compared  with  this  magnificent  suggestion,  is 
the  real  value  of  the  fisheries,  will  be  shown  hereafter.  What  is 
the  value  of  the  transit  privilege  that  has  now  for  thirty  years 
been  gratuitously  accorded  is  shown  in  the  facts  that  have  above 
been  given.  To  the  end,  however,  of  enabling  themselves  to  obtain 
a  large  price  for  the  one,  while  paying  nothing  for  the  other,  it  was 
needed  to  show  how  readily  the  Canadas  could  dispense  with  that 
which  for  so  long  a  period  had  constituted,  during  two-fifths  of  the 
year,  their  sole  means  of  communication  with  the  outer  world  free 
from  custom-house  interruption,  and  hence  it  is  that  we  find  in  this 
remarkable  document  the  passage  above  referred  to,  and  which  reads 
as  follows: — 

"  Under  the  influence  of  the  formal  notice  given  by  the  United  States  in  1865,  of 
their  intention  to  terminate  the  Treaty,  federation  of  the  Provinces,  then  under  dis- 


1861.  1871. 

*  Upper  Canada 1,396,061  1,620,851 

Lower         *'         .         .         .         .         .     1,110,666  1,191,516 


2.506,727  2,812,367 

How  great  had  been  the  difference  of  the  two  policies  as  regarded  their  influence 
on  population  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  the  increase  of  Minnesota  alone  had  been 
greater  than  that  of  Upper  Canada,  and  that  of  Missouri  nearly  twice  that  of  the 
Canadian  provinces  combined. 


cussion,  was  harried  on  and  became  ^  fait  accompli  •viMhin  fifteen  months  after 
its  repeal.  The  Intercolonial  railway  was  at  once  undertaken,  at  a  cost  of  over 
$20,000,000,  at  the  national  expense,  to  secure  direct  connection  to  and  from  the 
Atlantic  Ocean,  at  Halifax  and  St.  Johns  on  Canadian  soil ;  and  the  last  section 
of  that  road  will  be  shortly  opened  for  traffic." 

So  far  as  regards  the  mere  words  of  this  statement  it  is  certainly 
true.  A  road  has  been  in  process  of  construction,  and  will  probably 
be  completed  in  the  course  of  the  coming  year  ;  but  how  far  it  can 
by  any  possibility  be  attended  with  snch  results  as  are'  here  sug- 
gested, if  not  even  vouched  for,  by  Commissioners,  one  of  whom 
represents  her  Britannic  Majesty  Queen  Victoria,  and  the  other  the 
Government  of  the  Dominion,  you  will  be  enabled,  Mr.  President, 
to  judge  after  study  of  the  following  facts: — 

From  Montreal  to  Portland  the  distance  is  less  than  200  miles, 
most  of  the  country  through  which  the  road  passes  being  sufficiently 
settled  to  enable  it  to  contribute  largely  toward  maintenance  and 
further  improvement  of  its  communications  within  itself  and  with 
the  outside  world. 

From  Montreal  to  Halifax,  through  British  territory,  the  distance 
is  about  1000  miles,  of  the  last  800  of  which,  passing,  as  they  mainly 
do,  on  the  edge  of  an  uninhabited  and  uninhabitable  desert,  there  are 
but  very  few  which  can,  under  any  circumstances  whatsoever,  con- 
tribute toward  maintenance  and  improvement  of  a  road  that  has 
been  made  for  no  purpose  other  than  that  of  purchasing,  by  means 
of  a  large  and  wasteful  expenditure,  the  assent  of  the  lower  pro- 
vinces to  the  federation ;  but  which,  as  the  Commissioners  would 
now  have  us  believe,  is  to  render  the  Dominion  entirely  indepen- 
dent of  her  neighbors  south  of  the  lakes.  How  far  this  can  prove 
to  be  true  we  may  now  examine  as  follows: — 

The  charges  for  transportation  of  th^  rudest  products  on  such  a 
road,  cannot  be  less  then  2J  cents  per  mile,  or,  for  800  miles, 
$20  per  ton  ;  equivalent  to  60  cents  for  a  bushel  of  wheat.  Add 
to  this  one-third  as  much  for  transport  of  merchandise  received  in 
return,  and  we  have  80  cents  per  bushel  additional  to  the  total  charge 
by  way  of  Portland.  Trade  under  such  circumstances  could,  for 
little  less  than  half  the  year,  have  no  existence  whatsoever,  and  the 
upper  provinces,  limited  to  that  route  alone,  must  steadily  decline  in 
population,  passing  gradually  toward  the  condition  in  which  they 
had  stood  at  the  date  of  the  first  grant  of  transit  privileges. 

Having  studied  carefully  these  facts,  Mr.  President,  you  can  have 
little  hesitation  as  to  the  cause  of  the  sudden  appearance  of  the 
"happy  thought"  above  referred  to. 

Having  so  studied  them  you  will,  Mr.  President,  be  enabled  to 
form  a  somewhat  correct  idea  of  the  general  value  of  this  "memo- 
randum," the  accuracy  of  whose  presentations  is  vouched  for  by 
Her  Britannic  Majesty's  Kepresentative  in  Washington,  Sir  Edward 
Thornton,  and  by  the  Canadian  Commissioner,  the  Honorable  George 
Brown;  and  also  to  appreciate  the  real  motives  of  those  by  whom 
you  had  been  induced  to  transmit  such  a  Treaty,  and  even  to  urge 


9 

its  consideration,  at  a  time  when  there  remained  but  three  days  of 
senatorial  life;  and  when  so  many  other  important  measures  re- 
mained unmatured.  Happily,  you  yourself  assumed  no  responsi- 
bility in  reference  to  its  contents,  the  Senate  having  been  advised 
that  you  were  not  prepared  to  say  "as  to  whether  it  makes  all  the 
concessions  that  could  justly  be  required  of  Great  Britain,  or 
whether  it  calls  for  more  concessions  from  the  United  States  than 
we  should  yield." 

Seeking  now  the  responsible  authors  of  the  extraordinary  mea- 
sure thus  proposed,  we  are  led  at  once  to  turn  to  the  Secretary  of 
State,  whose  letter  to  yourself,  Mr.  President,  by  which  it  was 
accompanied,  is  here  given  as  follows: — 

"  Dfpartmrnt  of  State,  ' 

Washington,  June  17,  1874. 
"  I  have  the  honor  to  inclose  a  copy,  of  the  draught  of  a  treaty  for  the  reciprocal 
reg-ulations  of  the  commerce  and  trade  between  the  United  States  and  Canada, 
with  provisions  for  the  enlargement  of  the  Canadian  canals,  and  for  their  use  by 
United  States  vessels  on  terms  of  equality  with  British  vessels,  which  British 
plenipotentiaries  have  proposed  to  this  Government. 

(Signed)  HAMILTON  FISH. 
The  President." 

You  will  here  observe,  Mr.  President,  that  this  important  Treaty 
was  passed  forward  to  yourself  unaccompanied  by  even  the  slight- 
est suggestion  that  it  had  ever  been  considered,  or  even  read,  by 
your  Secretary  of  State.  That  it  had  not  been  so  would  seem  to 
be  conclusively  established  by  the  fact  that  that  gentleman  subse- 
quently, in  conversation  with  at  least  one  distinguished  senator,  gave 
assurance  that  he  "assumed  for  himself  no  responsibility  whatso- 
ever, the  Treaty  having  been  prepared  by  the  British  Commissioners, 
and  he  having  merely  as  a  matter  of  duty  caused  its  presentation  to 
the  Senate." 

Most  certainly,  Mr.  President,  you  could  not  so  have  understood 
this  matter  at  the  time  when  you  said  to  the  Senate — "I  therefore 
express  an  earnest  wish,  that  the  Senate  may  be  able  to  consider  and 
determine  before  the  adjournment  of  Congress  whether  it  will  give 
its  constitutional  concurrence  to  the  conclusion  of  a  Treaty  with 
Great  Britain  for  the  purposes  already  named,  either  in  such  form 
as  is  proposed  by  the  British  plenipotentiaries  or  in  such  other 
more  acceptable  form  as  the  Senate  may  prefer." 

Could  it  have  been  possible  that  you  would  so  have  spoken,  Mr. 
President,  had  you  understood  the  real  facts?  Assuredly  not.  You 
would  certainly  have  seen  that  a  fraud  had  been  in  preparation  far 
exceeding  any  of  those  which  had  recently  so  much  occupied  the 
Congressional  attention,  and  would  have  required,  for  examination 
into  the  character  of  a  measure  so  important,  that  time  of  which  it 
had  been  the  object  of  the  conspirators  engaged  in  its  preparation 
to  deprive  both  yourself,  Mr.  President,  and  the  many  millions  of 
pepple  who  were  to  be  bound  by  its  provisions  throughout  the 
long  period  of  five  and  twenty  years. 


10 

Having  thus  exhibited  in  some  small  degree  tlie  curiosities  of 
this  remarkable  diplomatic  feat,  I  propose  in  another  letter  to 
show  how  this  negotiation  compares,  in  the  arrangements  therefor, 
with  the  Treaty  of  Washington;  and  how  the  two  compare  with 
each  other  as  to  the  importance  of  the  questions  proposed  by  them 
to  be  settled;  meanwhile  remaining,  Mr.  President, 

Yours  very  respectfully, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 

Philadelphia,  Nov.  19,  1874. 


LETTER  THIRD. 

Mr.  President  : — 

Toward  the  close  of  the  administration  of  President  Johnson  the 
Hon.  Reverdy  Johnson  was  sent  to  England,  charged  with  an  efifort 
at  obtaining  satisfaction  for  the  many  and  serious  injuries  under 
which  throughout  the  whole  period  of  the  rebellion  we  had  so 
severely  suffered.  By  very  many  of  his  constituents,  and  by  me 
among  the  rest,  the  course  of  proceeding  thus  indicated  was  deemed 
unwise,  no  nation  having  ever  yet  obtained  justice  from  any  other 
nation  by  means  of  such  solicitation  as  was  to  be  now  attempted. 
That  in  the  view  thus  expressed  they  were  certainly  right  came 
soon  to  be  proved  by  the  fact,  that  the  British  press  with  one  voice 
denounced  our  claims  as  utterly  absurd ;  and,  that  so  little  was  the 
satisfaction  granted  that  not  onlj^  did  the  Senate  refuse  to  ratify  the 
convention  then  submitted  for  its  consideration;  but  that  you, 
yourself,  Mr.  President,  in  your  first  message,  denounced  it  in  the 
terms  that  follow,  to  wit: — 

"Toward  the  close  of  the  last  administration  a  convention  was  signed  at  liOndon 
for  the  settlement  of  all  outstanding  claims  between  Great  Britain  and  the  United 
States,  which  failed  to  receive  the  advice  and  consent  of  the  Senate  to  its  ratifi- 
cation. The  time  and  the  circumstances  attending  the  negotiation  of  that  treaty 
were  unfavorable  to  its  acceptance  by  the  people  of  the  United  States,  and  its  pro- 
visions were  wholly  inadequate  for  the  settlement  of  the  grave  wrongs  that  had 
been  sustained  by  this  government  as  well  as  by  its  citizens.  The  injuries  result- 
ing to  the  United  States  by  reason  of  the  course  adopted  by  Great  Britain  during 
our  late  civil  war  in  the  increased  rates  of  insurance ;  in  the  diminution  of  exports 
and  imports,  and  other  obstructions  to  domestic  industry  and  production :  in  its 
effect  upon  the  foreign  commerce  of  the  country,  in  the  decrease  and  transfer  to 
Great  Britain  of  our  commercial  marine ;  in  the  prolongation  of  the  war,  and  the 
increased  cost  (both  in  treasure  and  in  lives)  of  its  suppression  ;  could  not  be  ad- 
justed and  satisfied  as  ordinary  commercial  claims  which  naturally  arise  between 
commercial  nations.  And  yet  the  convention  treated  them  simply  as  such  ordi- 
nary claims,  from  which  they  differ  n^ore  widely  in  the  gravity  of  their  character 
than  in  the  magnitude  of  their  amount,  great  even  as  is  that  difference.  Not  a 
word  was  found  in  the  treaty,  and  not  an  inference  could  be  drawn  from  it,  to  re- 
move the  sense  of  the  unfriendliness  of  the  course  of  Great  Britain  in  our  struggle 
for  existence,  which  had  so  deeply  and  universally  impressed  itself  upon  the  people 
of  this  country." 


11 

The  year  that  followed  having  exhibited  no  change  in  the  rela- 
tions of  the  two  countries,  and  no  improvement  on  the  part  of  the 
provincial  authorities,  your  second  message  recommended,  first — 

"The  appointment  of  a  commission  to  take  proof  of  the  amounts  and  the  owner- 
ship of  their  several  claims  on  notice  to  the  representatives  of  her  majesty  at 
Washington ;  and  that  authority  be  given  for  the  settlement  of  their  claims  by  the 
United  States,  so  that  the  government  shall  have  the  ownership  of  the  private 
claims  as  well  as  the  responsible  control  of  all  the  demands  against  Great  Britain. 
It  cannot  be  necessary  to  add  that  whenever  her  majesty's  government  shall  enter- 
tain a  desire  for  a  full  and  friendly  adjustment  of  these  claims,  the  United  States 
will  enter  upon  their  consideration  with  an  earnest  desire  for  a  conclusion  consist- 
ent with  the  honor  and  dignity  of  both  nations." 

and  second,  the  passage  of  a  joint  resolution  authorizing  the  Presi- 
dent— 

"To  suspend  by  proclamation  the  operation  of  the  laws  authorizing  the  transit 
of  goods,  wares,  and  merchandise  in  bond  across  the  territory  of  the  United  States 
to  Canada ;  and,  further,  should  such  an  extreme  measure  become  necessary,  to 
suspend  the  operation  of  any  laws  whereby  the  vessels  of  the  dominion  of  Canada 
are  permitted  to  enter  the  waters  of  the  Lnited  States." 

Now,  for  the  first  time,  did  the  British  people  awake  to  the  fact 
that  they  were  really  to  be  held  accountable  for  the  many  and 
grievous  sins  of  which  they  had  been  guilty,  prompted  thereto  by 
an  almost  universally  prevalent  idea — so  gladly  expressed  by  Earl 
Eussell  when  using  the  term  Dis-United  States — that  the  prosperity 
of  Britain  was  to  be  promoted  by  any  and  every  measure  tending 
to  production  of  discord  between  the  farming,  the  planting,  and  the 
industrial  portions  of  the  Union  ;  between  those  in  which  freedom 
had  been  established,  and  those  in  w^hich  slavery  had  been  until  then 
maintained.  The  alarm  now  excited  being  in  full  proportion  to 
the  contempt  hitherto  expressed,  Britain  herself  became  appli- 
cant for  a  settlement ;  and  hence  it  was  that  the  Treaty  of  "Wash- 
ington came  at  length  to  be  arranged.  What  was  by  it  allowed  to 
us,  what  the  price  agreed  to  be  paid  therefor,  and  what  the 
machinery  by  means  of  which  the  arrangement  was  effected,  it  is 
proposed  now  to  show,  as  follows: — 

First.  We  were  permitted,  at  heavy  cost,  to  prove  a  debt  which, 
after  deducting  the  counter-payments  required  to  be  made,  amount- 
ed to  less  than  a  single  month  of  our  customs  revenue,  or  about 
$13,000,000.  Had  your  suggestion,  Mr.  President,  been  adopted,  and 
had  Congress  authorized  the  assumption  of  all  properly  authenti- 
cated claims,  the  repayment  by  Britain  might  have  been  postponed 
ad  infinitum  without  causing  a  moment  of  anxiety  to  any  of  our 
Finance  Ministers. 

Second.  Provision  was  made  for  submitting  to  arbitration  the 
question  of  the  Northwest  boundary  line,  a  matter  that  time  alone 
w6uld  effectually  have  settled ;  each*  and  every  day  furnishing  new 
evidence  that  British  Columbia  must  at  no  distant  day  cease  to  be  a 
portion  of  the  British  empire. 

Third.  Certain  arranojements  were  made  in  reference  to  canal  and 


12 

river  transportation,  none  of  which  could  have  been  deemed  neces- 
sary on  our  part,  had  proper  attention  been  given  to  a  passage  here 
below  given  from  the  special  agent's  report  (the  italics  being  mine), 
then  on  the  tables  of  both  Houses  of  Congress,  as  follows: — 

"  No  one  will  question  that  we  find  convenience  and  advantage  in  the  use  of 
Canadian  channels  for  the  passage  of  our  commerce  between  the  Eastern  and 
Western  States,  nor  that  we  find  profit  in  acting  as  the  carriers  of  so  large  a  part 
of  the  commerce  of  Canada  with  the  outside  world.  Both  these  arrangements  of 
trade  are  of  important  value  to  this  country,  and  its  interests  would  suffer  materially 
from  any  suspension  of  either  ;  but  the  difi'erence  in  the  situation  of  the  two  coun- 
tries with  reference  to  them  is  very  marked.  To  the  Canadian  provinces  their 
importance  is  nothing  less  than  vital,  since  on  the  one  hand  the  very  sustenance 
of  the  arterial  system  of  the  Canadas  is  derived  from  the  American  commerce 
which  circidates  through  it ;  while  on  the  other  hand  their  own  commerce  with 
the  world  abroad  can  only  be  conducted  at  exceeding  disadvantage,  if  at  all  for  five 
months  of  the  year,  otherwise  than  across  the  territory  of  the  United  States,  and 
by  the  privilege  of  the  customs  regulations  of  the  American  government." — 
Lamed,  Report  on  the  State  of  Trade,  Jan.  1871. 

Graciously  now  permitted  to  make  contributions  toward  support 
of  Canadian  canals  and  roads  without  which  they  could  not  be 
maintained,  we  were  required  to  pay  for  the  privilege  of  so  doing 
by  granting  to  Canadian  ships  the  same  right  of  way  on  Lake 
Michigan,  within  our  border,  that  they  enjoyed  upon  the  border 
lakes. 

Fourth.  The  fisheries  question  was  disposed  of  by  providing  that 
we  might  re-purchase  rights  which  had  been  secured  to  us  by  the 
peace  of  1783,  but  which  had  been  brought  into  question  under 
Canadian  interpretation  of  the  convention  of  1818.  The  price  to  be 
paid  was,  first,  a  renewal  of  that  free  admission  of  fish  which  had 
been  granted  under  the  former  treaty,  and  under  which  our  imports 
of  fish  and  their  products  had  grown  from  §800,000  to  |3,000,000, 
while  our  tonnage  engaged  in  the  fisheries  had  fallen  from  137,000 
in  1854  to  89,000  in  1866 ;  and,  by  aid  of  constant  persecution  on 
the  part  of  the  Dominion  authorities,  to  an  average  of  but  73,000 
in  1868  and  1869.  The  gain  from  reciprocity  having,  as  here  is 
shown,  been  all  on  the  Canadian  side,  we  were  now,  of  course, 
required  not  only  to  renew  the  former  stipulation  as  to  compensa- 
tion to  be  made  therefor,  but  also,  to  add  thereto  the  free  enjoyment 
of  fishing  rights  along  our  Atlantic  coast  as  well  as  free  market 
here  for  all  their  products.  Not  content  with  having  thus  secured 
a  price  far  greater  than  the  real  value  of  all  they  seemed  to 
grant,  the  Dominion  authorities  insisted  upon  a  money  payment  in 
addition;  and  by  way,  probably,  of  proving  that  no  limit  could  be 
set  to  our  concessions,  it  was  provided  that  a  commission  should  be 
instituted  whose  duty  it  would  be  to  determine  what  further  price 
must  be  paid  should  it,  on  investigation,  be  proved  that  the  rights 
of  older  times,  whose  re-purchase  had  been  authorized,  had^a 
greater  money  value  than  could  be  assigned  to  the  extensive  and 
important  privileges  now  granted  to  the  colonists.  In  full  accord- 
ance with  the  general  principles  which  seem  to  have  been  established 


13 

for  government  of  the  body  by  which  this  remarkable  treaty  was 
negotiated,  not  a  word  appears  to  have  been  said  in  reference  to  the 
question  as  to  whether  or  not  payment  should  be  made  to  us  in  the 
event  of  its  being  established  that  the  privileges  we  had  granted  had 
a  value  far  greater  than  could  be  assigned  to  the  rights  upon  whose 
re-entry  we  were  to  be  now  permitted."^ 

Absolutely  worthless  as  was  all  we  had  obtained,  we  were  now, 
in  further  payment,  required  to  renew  to  the  Canadas,  ^tqq  of  charge, 
a  grant  of  right  of  way  that,  as,  Mr.  President,  has  been  shown,  is 
vital  to  their  existence ;  ^nd  further,  not  only  to  grant  to  Britain 
a  full  and  entire  release  from  the  dangers  to  which,  in  the  event  of 
war,  her  commerce  had  become  subjected,  but  also  such  a  defini- 
tion of  neutral  rights  as  must  in  all  the  future  secure  British  pro- 
perty on  the  ocean  from  seizure  by  our  ships.f 

Such,  Mr.  President,  were  the  concessions  obtained  at  a  moment 

*  "  The  statement  of  the  provisions  of  the  Treaty  relating  to  the  fisheries,  is  the 
best  argument  against  them  For  the  privilege  of  fisliing  without  annoyance,  and 
buying  bait,  for  catching  mackerel  only,  within  three  miles  of  the  shore  of  the  British 
province,  which  has  been  and  can  be  demonstrated  even  by  the  admission  of  the 
Canadian  authorities  themselves  to  be  scarcely  worth  seven  thousand  dollars  a  year, 
the  Treaty  throws  open  all  our  fisheries,  from  Eastport  to  Delaware  Bay,  to  British 
fishermen  in  full  competition  with  our  own. 

"In  addition  to  which  we  are  to  give  the  introduction  of  all  kinds  of  fish  and  fish- 
oils  free  of  duty  into  this  country,  and  virtually  open  to  Canada  a  trade  and  industry 
which  produces  more  than  twelve  millions  yearly  to  the  United  States.  And  while 
we  surrender  all  this,  we  make  no  provision  for  tlie  reimbursement  of  our  fishermen 
for  their  vessels  seized  and  confiscated  without  right,  while  prosecuting  their  hardy 
toil  of  the  sea,  for  a  series  of  years  by  Canadian  and  British  cruisers.  And  yet  all 
the  people  are  [assumed  to  be]  in  favor  of  every  provision  of  the  Treaty  of  Wash- 
ington !"—,ffo«.  B.  F.  Butler. 

t  "Bear  in  recollection  that  Great  Britain,  during  the  war,  had  in  efl'ect  ruined 
our  commerce  ;  that  from  that  shock  it  has  in  no  considerable  degree  recovered;  that 
England  is  to-day  doing  the  carrying  trade  of  the  world  in  her  ships  ;  that  it  is  of 
the  last  importance  to  her  to  be  able  to  protect  her  shipping,  so  that  she  may  bring 
to  her  island  raw  material  and  there  manufacture  it  and  carry  back  the  product ;  and 
you  will  understand  the  necessity  of  this  second  rule  to  Great  Britain  in  time  of  war 
— especially,  if  adopted,  as  we  have  covenanted  it  shall  be,  by  the  other  maritime 
powers;  and  this  necessity  appears  more  clearly  in  view  of  the  fact,  as  the  British 
Commissioners  claim,  that  this  rule  is  not  now  a  part  of  the  Law  of  Nations. 

"  Under  this  rule,  no  private  or  public  armed  vessel  of  a  nation  at  war  can  get  any 
supplies  to  aid  her  in  carrying  on  warlike  operations  in  any  foreign  port  of  the  world. 
Now  it  has,  without  doubt,  come  to  be  settled  law  that  coal,  to  a  steam  vessel-of-war, 
is  a  military  supply.  Nothing  is  more  certain  than  that  all  attacks  upon  an  enemy's 
commerce  must  hereafter  be  made  by  swift  armed  steam-vessels,  as  was  done  by  the 
Shenandoah  and  Alabama  in  the  Confederate  raid  upon  our  own.  But  speed  in  a 
steam-vessel  uses  up  coal  almost  in  an  arithmetical  ratio  of  progression  to  the 
amount  of  speed  attained.  Therefore  steam-vessels  pursuing  the  commerce  of  an 
enemy  must  use  vast  quantities  of  coal,  requiring  frequent  visitations  to  ports  and 
harbors  for  renewal.  Now,  the  United  States  have  not  a  single  coaling  station  in 
the  world,  beside  the  harbors  on  her  own  coasts,  other  than  hired  docks  in  neutral 
ports,  from  which,  under  this  rule,  we  must  be  at  once  shut  out  in  case  of  war.  The 
establishment  of  this  rule,  therefore,  protects  British  commerce  in  all  time,  because 
under  it  no  steam-vessel  of  war  of  the  United  States,  either  private  or  public,  can 
steam  more  than  five  days'  distance  from  our  own  coasts,  for  the  reason  that  no  one 
of  them  can  carry,  with  its  armament,  more  than  ten  days'  coal,  and  it  is  neither 
prudent  nor  safe  for  a  war  steamer  to  be  on  the  ocean  without  coal  to  return  to  port 
— five  days  out  and  five  days  back." — Ibid, 


14 

when  Britain  had  really -become  alarmed  at  the  dangers  with  which 
she  was  threatened,  and  when  but  slight  manifestation  of  self-respect 
on  our  part  would  have  been  required  for  obtaining  something 
approaching  to  a  reality  of  justice.  How  enormous  was  the  further 
price  paid  therefor  will  be  seen  on  a  comparison  of  the  claims 
secured  with  those  enumerated  in  the  passage  here  given  from  your 
first  message  and  now  rejected.  Such  comparison  would,  as  I  think, 
certainly  result  in  establishment  of  the  fact  that  in  the  admirable 
maxim  festina  lente — make  haste  slowly — would  have  been  found 
the  true  policy  of  the  Union  ;  and  that  the  Treaty  of  Washington, 
with  its  unparalleled  array  of  knights  and  nobles,  ministers  and 
judges,  president  elective  and  sovereigns  hereditary,  has  been,  so  far 
as  the  Union  was  concerned,  one  grand  mistake.  Comparing  now  the 
admirable  position  in  which  we  should  have  stood  had  your  advice, 
as  given  above  from  your  second  message,  been  followed  ;  or,  still 
further,  had  Congress  authorized  you,  under  certain  circumstances, 
to  notify  Britain  that  she  was  no  longer  to  hold  herself  entitled  to 
the  privileges  accorded  to  "the  most  favored  nations,"  with  the 
contemptible  one  in  which  we  have  since  been  placed,  need  we 
wonder  that  the  British  nation  should  have  raised  its  chief  negotia- 
tor on  this  occasion  to  aMarquisate?  Assuredly  not :  never  has 
diplomatist  better  earned  his  laurels  than  did  the  Earl  de  Grey  on 
this  occasion. 

Eeserving  for  another  letter,  Mr.  President,  consideration  of  the 
single  reason  that  has  recommended  this  unfortunate  Treaty  to  many 
of  our  citizens,  I  remain, 

Yours  very  respectfully, 

HENKY  C.  CAREY. 

November  20, 1874. 


LETTER  FOURTH. 

The  recommendation  of  the  Treaty  referred  to  in  my  last  is,  Mr. 
President,  that  by  its  means  peace  had  been  preserved ;  and  hence 
it  is  that  the  example  thereby  set  is  now  so  strongly  urged  upon  the 
world  at  large.  Than  this,  however,  there  could  be  no  greater  mis- 
take. The  American  people  had  no  desire  for  war,  and  all  the  fear 
thereof  was  on  the  British  side.  For  this  the  plain  and  simple 
reason  is,  that  from  day  to  day  she  is  making  herself  more  and 
more  dependent  on  foreign  trade,  and  less  and  less  capable  of  engag- 
ing in  war  with  any  civilized  power  of  even  moderate  force.  Hence 
it  is  that  she  now  turns  one  cheek  when  the  other  has  been  smitten, 
quietly  submitting  when  Germany  and  Russia  turn  deaf  ears  to 
her  remonstrances  on  behalf  of  Danes  and  Poles  ;  or  when  the  Czar 
tears  to  rags  that  Treaty  of  Paris  which  was  meant  to  secure  in 
all  the  future  the  control  of  Turkey  to  France  and  England.     Never 


15 

in  the  history  of  the  world  has  there  been  a  case  of  submission 
more  complete;  never  a  wider  contrast  than  that  presented  by  the 
almost  contemporaneous  conduct  of  Britain  toward  the  weak  com- 
munities of  the  East,  as  this  latter  will  here  be  shown,  as  follows: — 
Taking  first  the  case  of  the  Burmese  Empire,  we  have  a  statement 
of  facts,  given  by  Mr.  Torrens  in  his  recent  valuable  volume  enti- 
tled "Empire  in  Asia,"  which  reads  as  follows: — 

"At  first  the  lieutenant  of  the  Queen  demands  restitution  of  £990,  and  an 
apology,  from  the  governor  of  a  Burmese  town  ;  without  giving  time  for  fair  dis- 
cussion, he  raises  the  terms  of  his  requisition  to  £100,000  and  an  apology  from  the 
Burmese  Court;  and  while  a  temperate  letter  from  the  King,  offering  to  negotiate, 
remains  unanswered,  he  hurls  an  invading  force  against  his  realm,  drops  all  men- 
tion of  compensation  or  apology,  and  seizes  an  extensive  province,  with  threats  of 
further  partition  of  his  dominions  if  he  will  not  pay  the  expenses  of  the  war,  the 
world  being  asked  the  while  to  believe  that  all  has  been  done  unwillingly,  in  self- 
defence." 

Numerous  cases  of  a  similar  kind  are  given  by  Mr.  Torrens,  but, 
leaving  them  and  turning  now  to  China,  we  find  the  following  in 
reference  to  the  Opium  wars,  the  most  disgraceful  of  all  those  of 
recent  times : — 

"Mr.  Gladstone,  in  speaking  of  the  opium  war  with  China,  once  remarked  that 
'justice  was  on  the  side  of  the  Pagan.'  Never  was  this  more  true  than  at  the 
present  time,  when  a  Pagan  government,  in  spite  of  domestic  anarchy,  of  the 
paralyzing  influence  of  oflScial  corruption,  and  of  the  perpetual  menace  of  foreign 
intervention,  yet  nobly  endeavors  to  exert  what  remains  of  its  shattered  authority 
on  the  side  of  virtue  and  the  good  order  of  the  State.  On  the  other  hand,  I  know 
of  nothing  more  ignoble  than  the  heartless  indifference  with  which  the  failure  of 
these  patriotic  efforts  is  regarded  by  so-called  civilized  nations,  or  the  immoral 
cynicism  with  which  English  statesmen  not  only  excuse  but  justify  our  share  in 
entailing  the  greatest  of  calamities  on  one-third  of  the  human  race.  If  it  were 
possible  for  us  to  escape  from  the  responsibility  which  must  ever  attach  itself  to 
the  authors  of  the  first  Chinese  War ;  if  we  could  prove  that  in  forcing  the  legaliza- 
tion of  the  opium  trade  by  the  treaty  of  Tientsin  we  yielded  to  iron  necessity ;  if, 
moreover,  we  could  demonstrate  that  our  duty  to  India  compelled  us  to  prefer  the 
temporary  exigencies  of  revenue  to  the  lasting  interests  of  morality — it  would  still 
be  incumbent  on  us  to  face  the  fact  that  our  position  is  at  once  shameful  and 
humiliating.  But  when  we  know  that  the  direct  responsibility  of  every  act  that 
has  led  to  the  degradation  and  rapid  decline  of  the  Chinese  Empire  lies  at  our  own 
door,  and  that  the  policy  which  has  borne  these  evil  fruits  is  still  being,  in  a  great 
measure,  carried  out  by  the  concurrent  action  of  Anglo-Indian  administrators  and 
British  statesmen,  the  ignominy  demands  some  fortitude  for  us  to  bear  it.  We, 
however,  do  bear  it ;  and,  at  the  same  time,  lose  no  opportunity  of  ministering  to 
our  self-love  by  pretending  that  wherever  English  commerce  extends,  or  English 
influence  penetrates,  both  confer  untold  benefits  upon  the  less  favored  nations  of 
the  world." — Fortnightly  Review,  London,  September,  1871. 

"How  England  makes  and  keeps  Treaties,"  is  the  title  of  an 
article  in  a  recent  number  of  the  same  highly  respectable  journal, 
from  which  the  following  is  an  extract: — 

"  In  the  same  way  and  at  the  same  time,  we  have  everywhere  obtained  that  our 
goods  shall  be  imported  into  all  these  countries  at  duties  of  either  three  or  five 
per  cent.  We  are  continuing  to  apply  to  Eastern  nations  this  double  system  of 
tariffs,  and  jurisdiction  of  goods  and  judges.  To  attain  those  ends,  we  use  all 
sorts  of  means,  from  courteous  invitation  to  bombardments.     We  prefer  to  employ 


16 

mere  eloquence,  because  it  is  cheap  and  easy;  but  if  talking  fails  we  follow  it  up 
by  gunboats,  and,  in  that  convincing  way,  we  induce  hesitating  '  barbarians'  not 
only  to  accept  our  two  unvarying  conditions,  but  also  to  pay  the  cost  of  the 
expedition  by  which  their  consent  to  these  conditions  was  extorted  from  them. 
We  tried  patience  and  polite  proposals  with  Tunis,  Tripoli,  and  Morocco.  China 
was  so  unwilling  to  listen  to  our  advice,  so  blind  to  the  striking  merits  of  our 
opium  and  our  consuls,  that  we  were  obliged,  with  great  regret,  to  resort  to  gentle 
force  with  her.  Japan  presents  the  most  curious  example  of  the  series ;  it  is  made 
up  of  ignorance  circumvented  and  of  indignation  frightened.  Indeed,  if  we  had 
space  for  it,  the  story  of  the  Japan  treaties  would  be  worth  telling,  because  it  is  a 
very  special  one,  because  it  is  the  newest  triumph  of  our  justice  abroad,  and  be- 
cause it  may  be  taken  as  indicative  of  our  present '  manner,'  as  painters  say." 

As  is  here  most  truly  said,  the  "story"  of  Japan  is  well  "worth 
telling,"  and  so  fully  illustrates  the  danger  of  treaty  making  with 
a  nation  whose  prime  article  of  faith  is  found  in  the  brief  sentence 
"buy  in  the  cheapest  market  and  sell  in  the  dearest  one;"  and 
whose  cardinal  principle  of  political  practice  is  found  in  a  constant 
effort  at  compelling  the  nations  of  the  world  to  seek  her  market  both 
as  buyers  and  as  sellers,  that  I  here  give  of  it  the  latest  chapter, 
which  reads  as  follows: — 

A  dozen  years  since  Japan  concluded  treaties  with  Great  Britain, 
France,  and  other  European  powers,  closely  resembling  that  with 
Turkey,  and  those  with  other  Eastern  nations,  by  means  of  which 
they  have  been  so  largely  barbarized,  and  so  generally  ruined.  Un- 
used to  treaty  making,  however,  the  Japanese  authorities  wisely 
inserted  provisions  by  means  of  which  it  was  supposed  to  be  secured 
that  those  now  made  were  to  be  replaced  by  others  at  the  close  of 
the  first  decade.  That  time  arrived  two  years  since,  and  down  to 
the  last  hour  it  was  supposed  that  new  treaties  would  be  made. 
Not  so  however,  Britain  at  once  asserting  that  there  could  be  no 
"  revision,"  except  with  the  consent  of  both  parties,  and  that  until 
such  consent  should  have  been  obtained  the  original  treaty  must 
remain  in  force.  From  that  time  the  Japanese  government  has 
stood  in  the  position  of  being  compelled  to  submit  to  all  the  pro- 
visions of  a  treaty  whose  maintenance  cannot  fail  to  result  in  utter 
ruin;  or,  on  the  other  hand,  risk  being  involved  in  war  with  a 
nation  that  has  always  in  the  Eastern  seas  more  vessels  of  war  than 
would  be  required  to  close  at  once  all  that  great  domestic  commerce, 
now  carried  on  by  means  of  boats  and  ships,  between  the  various 
towns  and  cities,  islands  and  provinces  of  the  empire.  Here,  as 
everywhere  where  Britain  is  concerned,  might  triumphs  over  right. 

Careful  study  of  these  facts,  Mr.  President,  can  hardly  fail  as  I 
think  to  satisfy  you,  that  in  treating  with  that  nation,  more  than 
with  any  other,  the  greatest  caution  is  required.  How  far  such 
caution  has  been  exhibited  by  those  to  whom  we  stand  indebted  for 
this  present  Treaty  shall  be  shown  in  a  future  letter  by 

Yours  very  respectfully, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 

Philadelphia,  Nov.  21, 1874. 


17 


LETTEK  FIFTH. 

Mr.  President:  At  the  trivial  cost  of  a  few  millions  of  dollars 
Britain  had  now  not  only  secured  herself  against  a  demand  for  repara- 
tion of  error,  whether  of  commission  or  omission,  in  the  past,  but  had 
so  far  strengthened  herself  on  the  ocean  as  to  enable  her,  in  all  the 
future,  to  set  at  utter  defiance  any  nation  uniting  with  us  in  giving 
assent  to  the  newly-devised  rules  in  regard  to  neutral  rights.  Fur- 
ther, slie  had  enabled  her  colonial  dependents  not  only  to  sell  their 
wares  at  greatly  more  than  their  real  value,  but  had  also  secured 
insertion  of  a  provision  by  means  of  which  the  hitherto  eternally- 
recurring  fisheries  question  should  again  be  brought  upon  the 
stage,  giving  occasion  for  the  production  of  that  "  happy  thought" — 
fully  exhibiting  itself  in  the  "  Memorandum"  now  before  us — whose 
object  is  that  of  setting  aside  all  the  legislation  by  whose  aid  it  had 
been  sought  to  secure  our  domestic  commerce,  and  our  navigation 
interests,  against  foreign,  and  mainly  against  British,  interference. 

To  that  end  it  was  essential  to  magnif}^  and  that  to  the  utmost 
possible  extent,  the  value  of  those  rights  whose  repurchase  had 
been  permitted,  while  in  a  corresponding  degree  undervaluing 
the  highly  important  privileges  we  had  granted;  and  hence  it  is 
that  we  have  been  favored  with  estimates,  varying  between  five  and 
fifty  millions,  of  the  claims  now  to  be  made  upon  our  national 
treasury.  Following  out  this  idea,  the  Commissioners  inform 
us  that  the  fishing  privileges  granted  us  are  absolutely  "  priceless;" 
meantime  carefully  reminding  us  that  in  the  event  of  refusal  to 
grant,  and  that  without  delay,  the  demands  now  made  we  shall  be 
held  liable  for  the  large  amount  of  money  that  the  mixed  Com- 
mission will  be  sure  to  grant.  What  is  their  real  value  and  how  it 
accords  with  the  view  thus  presented  is  shown  in  the  following 
fact : — 

Our  tonnage  engaged  in  the  cod  and  mackerel  fisheries  in  the 
three  years  preceding  adoption  of  the,  so-called,  reciprocity  system, 
in  1854,  averaged  157,000  tons.  In  the  closing  year  of  that  system 
it  had  fallen  to  89,000  tons.  Two  years  lateV,  in  1868,  it  had 
further  fallen  to  82,000,  and  the  average  of  that  and  the  following 
year  was  7^1,000  tons.  In  the  last  fiscal  year  it  has  grown  to  99,000 
tons,  the  "priceless"  boon  having  enabled  us  to  reach  a  point  more 
than  a  third  lower  than  that  at  which  we  had  arrived  twenty  years 
since,  before  sham  reciprocity  had  been  adopted. 

Such  being  the  facts,  may  we  not,  Mr.  President,  feel  somewhat 
surprised  that  your  Secretary  of  State  should  have  allowed  so  false 
a  presentation  of  the  case,  prepared  by  foreign  hands,  to  be  laid 
before  the  Senate;  that,  too,  without  a  word  tending  toward  revival 
in  their  minds  of  the  fact  that,  three  years  before,  there  had  been  laid 
upon  senatorial  tables  an  American  report  by  which  it  had  been 
shown  that  under  "reciprocity"  tiie  fisheries  had  almost  perished? 


18 

Is  there,  Mr.  President,  any  other  country  in  the  world,  having  a 
really  organized  government,  in  which  such  a  transaction  could 
have  occurred?     I  doubt  it  very  much. 

Nominally  treating  of  a  reciprocal  free  trade  with  the  British 
provinces,  this  treaty  is  really  one  of  free  trade  with  the  Britisli 
empire,  the  imperial  government  granting  the  privilege  of  free  im- 
port from  this  country  of  a  vast  variety  of  manufactured  articles, 
conditioned,  however,  that,  as  compensation  therefor,  the  colonists 
secure  to  Britain  herself  the  right  to  pass  free  into  Canada^  as  a  step 
toward  passage  into  the  Union,  similar  commodities,  as  being  of  the 
"growth,  produce,  or  manufacture"  of  the  Dominion.  The  whole 
arrangement  is  but  a  new  edition  of  the  fable  of  the  monkey  and 
the  cat,  the  former  employing  the'  latter  to  draw  from  the  fire  the 
chestnuts  that  would  have  burnt  his  own  fingers  had  he  attempted 
to  do  the  work  himself. 

At  what  cost  to  Canada,  and  ultimately  to  ourselves,  we  are  to 
be  allowed  to  obtain  the  "  priceless"  privilege  by  means  of  which 
we  have  been  enabled  to  add  five  and  twentj^  thousand  tons  to  a 
fishing  fleet  that,  with  a  view  to  compel  our  repurchase  of  ancient 
rights,  has  been  harassed  almost  out  of  existence,  is  shown  in  a 
passage;  here  given  from  the  Toronto  Mail,  as  follows: — 

"  Notwithstanding  all  that  has  been  said  and  written  about  the  proposed  treaty, 
during  several  months  past,  one  very  important  part  of  the  consequences  involved 
appears  to  be  as  yet  only  dawning  upon  the  public  mind,  *  *  *  *  The  new 
treaty  includes  many  things,  and  these  embracing  some  of  the  most  important 
of  our  manufactures,  that  the  old  one  did  not.  Further,  the  extension  of  the  free 
list  to  such  an  extent  in  manufactured  goods  necessitates  the  formal  declaration 
made  in  Memorandum  of  negotiations  published  a  few  weeks  ago,  to  the  effect 
that  tuhatever  we  admit  free  coming  from  the  States  must  also  be  free  coming 
from  England.  In  spite  of  all  the  publicity  that  has  been  given  to  this  feature  of 
the  treaty — or  connected  with  it,  as  we  should  say,  for  it  does  not  appear  in  the 
treaty  at  all — the  public  generally  are  but  beginning  to  find  out  that  free  trade 
with  England  as  well  as  with  the  United  States,  is  really  'provided  for.  We  are 
every  day  hearing  of  influential,  generally  well-informed  men,  who  say  that  the 
fact  just  stated  is  to  them  a  recent  revelation,  and  that  until  very  lately  they  had 
no  idea  that  a  treaty  with  the  United  States  carried  such  sweeping  consequences. 
They  say  that,  had  they  known  it  sooner,  they  would  have  been  heard  from  more 
decidedly  on  the  question." 

That  the  treaty  is  in  effect  a  British,  and  not  a  Canadian,  measure, 
and  that  its  tendency  is  in  the  direction  of  subjugation  to  British 
domination  of  the  whole  country  north  and  south  of  the  St.  Law- 
rence, is  shown  in  a  passage  from  the  Sheffield  Telegraphy  which  reads 
as  follows : — 

"What  wonder  these  gentlemen  indulged  in  heated  speeches  and  passed  con- 
demnatory resolutions  ?  They  know,  that,  the  reciprocity  treaty  once  passed,  the 
days  of  monopoly  are  numbered.  Congressional  and  especially  Senatorial  mills 
grind  slowly,  but  with  the  new  Democratic  blood  being  rapidly  introduced  into 
their  management,  they  will  inevitably  grind  monopoly  into  an  impalpable  powder. 
*  *  *  England  has  been  emphatically  assured  by  the  Canadian  Prime  Minister, 
the  Canadian  plenipotentiary,  and— lastly  and  most  strongly — by  Lord  Dufierin, 
in  his  speech  at  Chicago,  that  Canada  will  not  consent  to  a  differential  arrange- 
ment to  the  prejudice  of  the  mothe'p  country.     la  other  words,  what  the  UmLtd 


19 

States  is  permitted  to  import  ivto  Canada  at  specijic  duty  or  free  of  duty,  that 
alfio  it  will  be  arranged  may  be  imported  from  (he  United  Kingdom  on  precisely 
the  same  terms.  Well,  then,  shall  not  our  iron  and  hardware  manufacturers  go 
up  and  possess  the  land  ?  *  *  *  Shoals  of  Americaa  citizens  are  passing 
over  to  Canada  in  the  summer  season,  and  as  we,  when  in  a  continental  country, 
buy  our  box  of  cij^^ars  or  other  cheap  products  of  that  country,  so  American  citi- 
zens in  Canada  ransack  ihe  various  cities  and  towns  for  cheap  purchases  ;  articles 
of  British  manufacture  being  specially  in  demand.  Our  serious  advice  to  our 
manufacturers  is :  Leave  no  stone  unturned  to  take  the  leading  position  in  the 
Canadian  markets  when  the  reciprocity  treaty  is  ratified.  Send  to  the  New  Do- 
minion the  best  specimens  of  your  manufacture,  and  charge  the  lowest  practicable 
price,  because  in  so  doing  you  will  be  hastening  the  downfall  of  American  mo- 
nopoly, and,  by  your  excellent  workmanship  and  reasonable  charges  in  the  smaller 
markets  of  Canada,  throwing  open  for  yourselves  the  larger  and  almost  unlimited 
market  of  the  American  Union,  and  obtaining  a  foothold  there  from  which,  if  you 
act  with  sustained  energy  and  discretion,  you  can  never  be  driven." 

North  and  south  of  the  St  Lawrence  it  has,  as  above  is  shown, 
been  desired  to  prevent  the  people  liable  to  be  affected  by  it  from 
understanding  that  the  real  intent  and  meaning  of  the  treaty 
was  that  of  ultimately  abolishing  all  the  protection  by  means  of 
which  an  industrial  independence  had  been  sought  to  be  established. 
How  the  Dominion  Administration  seeks  to  make  such  a  measure 
palatable  to  its  constituents  is  shown  in  the  following  passage  from 
one  of  its  journalistic  supporters: — 

"  The  three  articles  named  (coal,  fish,  and  lumber)  make  up  about  30  per  cent, 
of  our  exports  to  the  States.  If  the  free  admission  to  the  American  markets  of 
SO  per  cent,  of  our  exports  to  the  States  is  worth  seven  millions  a  year,  the  free 
admission  of  all  we  send  them  is  worth  twenty-three  millions  a  year.  *  *  * 
We  have  left  out  of  this  calculation  entirely  reciprocity  in  the  inland  coasting 
trade  and  the  free  registration  of  vessels,  'i'he  tory  leaders  would  have  us  refuse 
to  accept  the  immense  annual  value  the  Hon.  George  Brown  has  demanded  for 
the  free  use  of  our  fisheries,  because  it  may  compel  a  few  manufacturers  to  change 
the  manner  of  doing  business." — Ontario  Reformer. 

Such  being  the  real  facts  of  the  case,  the  writer  "  wonders — 

*'  that  any  sensible  writer  should  quote  his  (Senator  Morton's)  speech  as  a 
reason  why  Canadians  should  oppose  reciprocity.  Canada,  so  situated  that  she 
will  have  all  the  advantages  of  being  a  State  in  the  American  Union,  and  all  the 
advantages  of  British  connection,  withoxd  any  of  the  disadvantages  of  either 
country,  will  be  in  a  most  happy  position.  Enjoying  free  access  to  the  two  best 
markets  in  the  world  without  any  of  their  burdens  to  bear,  will  make  Canada 
about  the  best  country  to  emigrate  to  on  the  face  of  the  earth." — Ibid. 

That  the  views  thus  presented  are  in  harmony  with  those  of  the 
Canadian  government,  is  shown  in  a  passage  from  a  recent  speech 
of  the  Hon.  A.  Mackenzie,  Prime  Minister  of  the  Dominion,  which 
reads  as  follows  : — 

"  I  am  more  convinced  now  than  ever  that  in  the  port  of  Quebec  must  event- 
ually centre  the  whole  commerce  of  the  country.  There  can  be  no  question  that 
your  local  energy  can,  if  well-directed,  control  the  import  and  export  trade  of 
half  this  continent.  Not  merely  has  Quebec  the  convenient  situation  and  the  vast 
area  necessary  for  the  accommodation  of  all  our  own  transport,  but  also  for  that 
of  the  long  tier  of  the  Northern  United  States  which  stretch  along  our  border. 
We  are  now  making  great  efforts  to  extend  the  commercial  advantages  we  possess 
bj  the  renewal  of  the  reciprocity  treaty  with  our  neighbors.    Mr.  Brown  and  his 


20 

co-plenipotentiary  have,  as  you  are  aware,  laid  the  basis  of  a  new  treaty  at  Wash- 
ington. While  it  is  of  course  impossible  that  all  can  gain  every  advantage  they 
each  desire  in  the  matter,  1  am  perfectly  satisfied  that  Quebec  will  reap  enormous 
advantages  over  nil  other  places  under  the  proposed  measure,  which  will  no  doubt 
greatly  extend  our  trade  relations  on  both  sides  of  the  line." 

Inviting  now,  Mr.  President,  your  attention  to  the  fact  that  the 
Commissioners  urge  upon  us  that  the  re-establishment  of  sliam  re- 
ciprocity must  have  an  effect  directly  the  reverse  of  that  here  indicated^ 
to  wit,  that  of  securing  to  us  "  the  lion's  share  of  a  traffic  already 
amounting  to  two  hundred  and  thirty-five  millions  per  annum," 
I  am,  \Qry  respectfully, 

HENEY  C.  CAKEY. 

November  23,  1874. 


LETTER  SIXTH. 

Mr.  President:  South  of  the  lakes,  reciprocity  is  urged  upon 
our  people  as  a  means  of  relieving  themselves  from  the  payment  of 
duty  upon  Canadian  products.  That  north  of  us  reciprocity  is 
urged  on  the  ground  that  by  its  aid  Canadian  producers  will  be 
freed  from  the  heavy  duties  they  now  pay  into  our  national  trea- 
sury, is  shown  in  a  passage  Irom  the  journal  above  referred  to, 
replying,  as  it  does,  to  the  question,  "  Do  consumers  pay  duty  ?" 
here  given,  as  follows  : — 

"The  crop  of  wheat  in  the  United  States  is  officially  estimated  at  240,000,000 
of  bushels.  We,  as  a  Dominion,  imported  more  wheat  and  flour  than  we  exported 
in  1872,  as  per  our  government  official  returns.  It  is,  therefore,  very  evident  that 
we  could  not  influence  in  the  least  degree  the  market  price  of  wheat  in  the  United 
States,  and  that  if  we  seoid  our  wheat  there  lue  lose  the  duty.  The  proportion  of 
our  surplus  of  horses,  cattle,  sheep,  and  wool  to  the  amount  they  consume  is  so 
very  small  that  it  is  equally  plain  that  we  cannot  influence  the  price  in  their  mar- 
ket, and  that  ive  lose  the  duty.  The  Americans  consumed  last  year  nearly 
40,000,000  bushels  of  barley,  ot  which  we  gave  about  one-tenth.  If  one-tenth 
can  control  the  market  price,  then  we  can  dictate  the  price  of  barley  in  the  Un'ted 
States,  and  compel  the  consumer  to  pay  the  duty.  We  think  that  our  farmtrs 
lose  the  duty  on  barley,  or  at  least  the  greater  part  of  it.  The  American  people 
north  of  the  Ohio  consume  not  less  than  8,000,000,000  feet  of  pine  lumber  per 
annum,  of  which  we  gave  them  not  to  exceed  700,000,000  in  any  year,  or  about 
one-eleventh.  The  city  of  Chicago  alone  annually  receives  more  lumber  than  we 
export  to  all  countries.  We  supply  a  large  proportion  of  the  peas  consumed  in 
the  United  States,  and  we  think  that  the  consumer  of  them  pays  the  duty,  but 
this  is  the  ordy  -natural  prodad,  ivhelher  frovi  the  farm,  forest,  mine,  jr  sea, 
which  we  export  to  the  United  States  in  such  quantities  as  ivill  enable  us  to  com- 
pel the  consumer  to  pay  the  duty." 

The  view  here  presented  is  unquestionably  correct,  the  man  who 
must  go  to  market  being  always  coinpelled  to  jjay  the  cost  of  getting  there^ 
let  it  take  what  form  it  may,  whether  of  freight,  insurance,  or 
charges  at  the  custom  house.  Acutely  feeling  this,  British  manu- 
facturers now  resort  to  every  species  of  fraud  and  falsehood  ;  urging 


21 

upon  consumers  here  that  they  it  is  who  pay  the  duties,  meanwhile 
knowing  well  that  any  and  every  diminution  of  duties  paid  at  our 
custom  houses  goes  directly  toward  swelling  those  profits  by  whose 
aid  they  have  thus  far  been  enabled  to  retain  almost  the  world  at 
large  in  a  condition  of  industrial  dependence. 

That  the  Commissioners  have  been  not  unwilling  to  take  their  full 
share  in  the  great  work  thus  indicated,  it  is  proposed  now  to  show, 
as  follows : — 

At  page  18  of  their  **  Memorandum  on  the  commercial  relations" 
of  the  countries  north  and  south  of  the  lakes,  occurs  a  paragraph 
which  reads  as  follows:  — 

"The  entire  interchange  of  traffic  from  1820  to  1866  showed  a  cash  balance  in 
favor  of  the  United  States  of  S19o.2l9,272.  But  this  state  of  things  came  to 
a  sudden  end  with  the  expiration  of  the  treaty ;  and  the  balances  in  favor  of  the 
Dominion  have  since  been  as  follows  : — 

In  1866-67 $9,281,009 

1867-68 4,099.949 

1868-69 7.893.082 

1869-70 14,240,477 

1870-71 2,921,625 

1871-72 8,202,352 

1872-73 5,236,514 


Total  balance  against  United  States  in  seven  years        .  $51, 875,008" 

Reduced  to  plain  English,  this  passage — vouched  for  by  Sir  Ed- 
ward Thornton,  Minister  Plenipotentiary  of  Great  Britain  to  the 
United  States,  and  bv  the  Hon.  George  Brown,  Commissioner  rep- 
resenting the  Dominion — reads  as  follows:  "  So  long  as  the  Recip- 
rocity Treaty  continued  in  existence  there  was  a  large  balance  in 
favor  of  the  United  States.  So  soon  as  the  treaty  passed  out  of 
existence  all  this  changed,  the  balance,  in  every  year  that  has  since 
elapsed  having  been  ftivorable  to  the  Dominion."  How  now  stand 
the  real  facts  of  the  case?  Let  us  see!  In  the  first  two  years  of 
the  treaty  our  exports  to  the  British  Colonies  now  constituting  the 
Dominion  amounted  in  round  numbers  to  §43,000,000,  and  our  im- 
ports to  §29,000,000,  leaving  a  favorable  balance  of  §14,000,000 ; 
or  §7,000,000  per  annum.  In  the  last  three  years  of  the  treaty, 
ending  June  30,  1866,  our  exports  amounted  to  $81,000,000  and 
our  imports  to  §128,500,000,  leaving  an  unfavorable  balance  of 
$47,500,000,  or  an  average  of  nearly  §16,000,000  per  annum  ;  and 
yet  these  commissioners  stand  pledged  for  the  assertion  that  this 
latter  state  of  things  had  followed,  instead  of  having  preceded, 
abolition  of  the  sham  reciprocity  system  I 

How  the  present,  and  more  profitable,  system  has  operated,  is 
found  in  the  fact  that  from  §25,000,000  in  the  last  year  of  the  treaty, 
our  exports,  as  exhibited  in  the  Commerce  and  Navigation  Reports 
for  1878,  have  now  grown  to  §34,000,000;  our  imports  meanwhile 
having  fallen  to  §44,000,000,  leaving  an  unfavorable  balance  of  but 
§10,000,000,  or  little  more  than  a  fifth  of  that  of  the  three  last 
treaty  years  combined. 


22 

At  page  14  of  the  "  Memorandum^'  we  find  numerous  figures 
exhibiting  changes -in  the  "aggregate  imports  and  exports"  of 
several  years  immediately  previous  and  following  repeal  of  the 
treaty,  without  a  single  word  tending  to  show  that — as  in  1867, 
when  the  diminution  in  our  exports  had  been  but  $5,000,000, 
our  imports  meanwhile  falling  almost  five  times  that  amount — 
nearly  the  whole  loss  had  fallen  upon  the  Dominion  ;  and,  that 
hence  it  had  been  that  its  administration  had  so  eagerly  caught  at 
the  "  happy  thought"  above  referred  to. 

The  figures  throughout  this  document,  prepared  for  the  mystifi- 
cation of  senatorial  minds,  are  almost  countless.  What  is  their 
general  value,  Mr.  President,  may  be  inferred  from  the  fact  of  our 
being  here  assured  that  the  Dominion,  in  1871-2,  took  of  our  "  ex- 
port traffic  $22,152,464  more  than  France  and  all  her  possessions  ;" 
that  result  having  been  arrived  at  by  the  singular  process  of  adding 
to  our  twenty-seven  millions  of  real  exports,  more  than  twenty-four 
millions  of  goods  that  had  been  simply  allowed,  free  of  duty,  to 
cross  the  State  of  Maine! 

By  aid  of  a  similar  process  the  Commissioners  elsewhere  find 
themselves  enabled  to  assure  Senators  that  "with  the  exception 
of  Germany,  Canada  was,  in  the  year  1872-8,  the  largest  cus- 
tomer of  the  United  States  outside  of  the  British  empire;"  mean- 
time knowing  well,  that  of  the  nearly  twenty-seven  millions  of 
merchandise  passing,  duty  free,  from  Portland  to  Montreal,  and 
here  classed  as  being  of  our  home  production^  nearly  all  had  come  in 
the  winter  months,  giving  employment  to  British  steamers  that  in 
the  summer  had  traded  between  Liverpool  and  Montreal  ;  thus 
enabling  the  Dominion  to  maintain  an  intercourse  with  the  outside 
world  which  otherwise  could  have  had  no  existence.  Nevertheless, 
they,  with  calm  assurance,  assert  that  the  profits  of  this  transit 
trade  had  enured  mainly  to  the  United  States,  "  without  any  cor- 
responding advantage  to  the  provinces"! 

In  face  of  these  remarkable  misrepresentations  of  the  real  facts 
of  the  case,  the  Commissioners  gravely  volunteer  the  assurance 
that  in  the  preparation  of  this  "  Memorandum"  there  has  been  no 
"  arriere  ;;e?2see" — no  desire  at  concealment  or  misrepresentation  in 
regard  to  any  matter  whatsoever.     Qui  s^excuse^  s''accuse. 

Those  which  have  been  here  exhibited  are  but  types  of  those 
of  this  whole  "Memorandum,"  discreditable,  as  it  is,  to  its  authors, 
while  insulting  to  yourself,  Mr.  President,  and  to  that  Senate  for 
whose  mystification  it  had  been  prepared. 

It  may,  however,  Mr.  President,  be  asked  how  it  had  been  that 
the  Commissioners  should  have  ventured  so  to  play  with  facts  and 
figures.  To  this  the  answer  is,  that  this  document  had  not  been  in- 
tended for  the  public  eye,  if  indeed  for  the  eyes  of  all  the  Senators. 
Marked  "  confidential,"  and  sent  in,  as  a  public  document,  but  little 
more  than  a  fortnight  previous  to  adjournment,  when  all  were 
busily  occupied,  it  remained  so  private  that  eminent  members  of 
the   Senate,  known  to  be  opposed  to    "  reciprocity,"  could   with 


23 

difficulty  be  persuaded  that  such  a  paper  had  ever  been  brought  to 
senatorial  notice ;  and  it  may  now,  as  I  think,  be  confidently  as- 
serted that  it  would  to  this  hour  have  remained  unknown,  and  un- 
suspected, had  not  the  New  York  Trihune^  on  the  6th  of  June,  per- 
formed an  act  of  public  justice  in  favoring  its  readers  with  a  very 
copious  abstract  of  its  contents;  t"hus  for  the  first  time  enabling  our 
various  industrial  interests  to  obtain  some  idea  of  the  destructive 
character  of  the  movement  that  had  been  for  so  many  months  in 
preparation.  Secrecy  and  crime,  Mr.  President,  commonly  travel 
in  company,  and  when  these  transactions  shall  come,  as  I  think 
they  may,  to  be  fully  investigated,  it  will  be  found  that  the  case 
now  before  us  presents  no  exception  to  the  rule. 

How  far  it  could  have  been  justifiable  in  the  Treasury  Clerk, 
who  appears  from  the  '^  Memorandum"  itself  to  have  been  concerned 
in  its  concoction,  or  in  your  Secretary  of  State,  by  whose  order  it 
was  placed  in  the  hands  of  Senators,  to  endorse  in  any  manner 
whatsoever  a  production  so  little  creditable  to  those  concerned  in 
forcing  upon  the  Union  so  one-sided  and  destructive  a  measure,  I 
leave  for  you,  Mr.  President,  to  determine,  remaining  meanwhile, 

Very  respectfully, 

HENEY  C.  CAREY. 

Philadelphia,  November  24,  1874. 


LETTER  SEVENTH. 

Mr,  President: — 

Having  thus  exhibited  the  various  modes  in  which  our  northern 
friends  have  sought  to  prove  to  farmers  and  manufacturers, 
north  and  south  of,  the  lakes,  the  advantages  that  must  result 
from  establishing  for  all  the  future  a  perfect  industrial  dependence, 
I  proceed  now  to  show  what,  in  the  event  of  this  treaty  unfor- 
tunately becoming  the  law  of  the  land,  must  inevitably  be  the 
result,  so  far  as  we  ourselves  are  concerned,  as  follows: — 

The  first  three  articles  having  reference  to  those  *'  priceless" 
fisheries  for  which  we  have  already  so  largely  paid,  they  may  for 
the  present  be  laid  aside. 

By  the  fourth  it  is  provided,  in  schedule  A,  that  agricultural  pro- 
ducts generally,  wool  included,  timber,  fish,  salt,  ores,  and  raw 
materials  of  various  kinds,  shall,  for  the  next  three  years,  be  ad- 
mitted at  reduced  rates  of  duty,  and  thereafter,  for  the  term  of 
twenty-three  years,  free  of  all  duty  whatsoever. 

That  we  may  understand  the  necessary  operation  of  this  article 
it  is  needed  to  look  for  a  moment  at  the  widely-diff'ering  commercial 
policies  of  the  two  countries.  South  of  the  lakes  it  has  been 
deemed  expedient  to  bring  the  producer  to  the  side  of  the  consumer, 


24 

the  result  of  that  policy,  maintained  now  for  nearly  fourteen  years, 
having  been  that  of  making  so  large  a  demand  for  labor  as  to 
have  carried  immigration  upward  until  in  the  past  year  it  had 
arrived  at  nearly  half  a  million,  with  such  corresponding  increase 
in  the  demand  for,  and  prices  of,  all  those  products  of  the  field, 
the  farm,  and  the  mine,  whose  'prices  are  not  fixed  in  foreign 
markets,  as  to  have  made  a  demand  on  the  British  provinces  of 
almost  as  much  real  value  as  that  of  all  the  world  beside.  North 
of  the  lakes,  on  the  contrary,  the  policy  has  been  that  which 
looked  to  separation  of  the  producer  from  the  consumer,  as  a  conse- 
quence of  which  the  demand  for  labor  has  been  so  limited  that 
hundreds  of  thousands  of  Canadians  have  been  compelled  to  seek 
employment  within  the  Union;  and  that  the  total  growth  of  Upper 
Canada  in  population,  in  the  decade  1860-70,  has  but  little  ex- 
ceeded 200,000,  being  less  than  that  of  the  single  State  of  Min- 
nesota. As  a  further  consequence,  the  rude  products  of  Canada 
have,  to  a  large  extent,  found  their  best  market  south  of  the  border 
line;  that,  too,  despite  the  duties  payable  at  our  custom-house,  all 
of  which,  as,  Mr.  President,  was  clearly  shown  in  my  last,  they  feel 
and  know  to  have  been  paid  by  themselves  alone.  What  they  now 
ask  is,  that  the  moneys  they  have  thus  far  paid  into  our  treasury 
shall  in  the  future  be  retained  by  themselves,  to  the  end,  in  the  words 
of  Canadian  treaty  advocates,  that  they  may  '•'•have  all  the  advan- 
tages of  being  a  State  in  the  American  Union^  and  all  the  advantages 
of  British  connection  ivithout  any  of  the  disadvantages  of  either  country  J"* 
This  obtained,  and  '•'•enjoying  free  access  to  the  two  best  marhets  in  the 
ivorld,  without  any  of  their  burdens  to  bear,  ^^;^7?,"  as  the  enthusiastic 
writer  continues,  "  make  Canada  about  the  best  country  to  emigrate  to  on 
the  face  of  the  earths  How  far  it  can  be  to  the  interest  of  our 
farmers  to  co-operate  in  bringing  about  this  result  it  is  for  them  to 
determine. 

Schedule  B  extends  the  same  provisions  to  axes,  spades,  shovels, 
ploughs,  hammers,  and  agricultural  implements  of  almost  every 
description  whatsoever. 

Timber  is  cheap  in  Canada  and  so  is  iron  in  England.  What  is 
now  proposed  is,  that  the  latter  shall  supply  such  parts  of  ma- 
chines as  are  composed  of  iron,  Canada  doing  the  same  with  those 
composed  of  wood,  the  joint  products  passing  into  the  American 
market  duty  free.  The  direct  effect  of  this  would  be,  that  the 
whole  of  this  vast  manufacture  would  be  tran:?f erred  to  the  country 
beyond  the  lakes,  depriving  our  farmers  of  the  market  now  aftbrded 
them,  while  largely  contributing  toward  opening  for  cultivation  that 
great  wheat  country  of  northwestern  Canada,  all  of  whose  products 
are  to  be  admitted  here  duty  free.  On  this  head  a  highly  intelligent 
resident  of  Canada,  in  a  letter  now  before  me,  writes  as  follows: 
"In  a  few  years  the  Red  River  Territory,  including  the  Saskatche- 
wan Valley,  will  be  the  great  competitor  of  the  Western  Stales  in 
all  their  products.  Those  extensive  regions  are  amongst  the  most 
fertile  on  this  continent,  and  are  now  attracting  attention.    With  the 


25 

extension  of  the  Canadian  Pacific  Railroad  they  will  soon  be  settled, 
and  will  supply  the  United  States  with  cattle,  wool,  and  grain,  to 
the  serious  injury  of  war-taxed  American  citizens  of  contiguous 
States." 

Schedule  "C"  extends  the  same  provisions  to  iron  of  every  de 
scription,  from  the  pig  to  the  steel  bar,  the  locomotive,  the  station 
ary  engine,  and  mill  machinery  of  every  kind ;  to  various  cotton 
goods  ;  to  satinets,  tweeds,  boots,  shoes,  leather,  cabinet-ware,  paper 
and  paper-making  machines,  printing  type,  stereotyping  apparatus 
railroad  cars,  and  to  so  many  other  commodities  that,  with  time 
and  with  that  annihilation  of  many  important  branches  of  manu- 
facture which  must  inevitably  follow  treaty  ratification,  it  will  be 
found  that  almost  as  much  merchandise  will  pass  free  through 
Canada  as  will  pay  duty  at  our  custom  houses. 

How,  it  will  be  asked,  can  this  possibly  be  ?  For  answer,  I  have 
to  say,  that  nothing  could  be  more  simple.  A  few  furnaces  in 
Canada,  and  as  many  in  Nova  Scotia,  may  be  made  to  cover  hun- 
dreds of  thousands  of  British  pigs ;  a  dozen  steel  and  iron  mills  in 
like  manner  covering  hundreds  of  thousands  of  tons  of  rails.  A 
very  moderate  number  of  papermills  may  be  made  to  cover 
100,000  ream.s  of  paper.  Machinery  of  every  kind,  coming  out  in 
parts  ready  to  be  put  together  in  Canada,  must  be  here  received  as 
being  of  Canadian  manufacture.  That  this  must  certainly  be  so  will 
readily  be  seen,  it  being  clear  that  all  such  commodities,  "  being  the 
growth,  produce,  OR  manufacture  of  Canada  or  the  United  States," 
are  to  be  admitted  free  of  duty.  That  a  man  may  become  possessed 
of  an  axe  he  must  have  two  pieces,  one  of  iron  and  another  of 
wood.  Until  they  are  brought  together  he  has  no  axe.  The  man 
who  brings  them  together  claims  to  be  manufacturer  of  the  axe,  as 
the  man  who  brings  together  its  several  parts,  wood  and  iron, 
may  properly  claim  to  be  manufacturer  of  the  machinery  of  a  cot- 
ton mill. 

By  articles  Y.  and  YI.  it  is  provided  that,  as  a  boon  to  us,  certain 
canals  shall  be  enlarged,  or  constructed,  and  that  in  consideration 
thereof  we  shall  cause  other  canals  to  be  constructed,  by  means  of 
which  vessels  drawing  twelve  feet  may  pass  from  the  St.  Law- 
rence to  the  waters  of  the  Hudson,  and  thence  to  New  York.  How 
this  will  operate  we  may  now  examine,  leaving  aside,  for  the  pre- 
sent, the  well-known  fact,  that  of  the-  various  works  for  whose 
construction  we  are  here  made  to  ask,  the  major  part  has  long 
since  been  arranged  for  as  being  required  for  Canadian  purposes 
alone.  In  accordance  with  a  convention  to  that  effect,  the  parties 
to  this  treaty  maintain  each  one  war  vessel  on  the  lakes.  By  the 
treaty  this  is  practically  set  aside,  the  whole  British  fleet,  so  far  as 
it  draws  not  more  than  twelve  feet  of  water,  being  now  to  be 
brought  within  twelve  or  fifteen  days  of  Buffalo,  Cleveland,  Detroit, 
Milwaukee,  Chicago,  and  every  other  town  or  city  that  in  the  long 
period  of  five  and  twenty  years  may  come  into  existence  on  or  near 
the  borders  of  the  lakes.     In    the   event  of  future  difficulty  with 


26 

Britain  (and  great  difficulty  must  inevitably  result  from  such  a 
treaty  as  is  now  proposed),  what  can  we  do,  knowing  that  all  those 
cities  are  practically  under  the  guns  of  almost  the  whole  British 
fleet  ?  Shall  we  have  any  course  open  to  us  other  than  that  of 
abject  submission  ?  It  seems  to  me,  Mr.  President,  that  we  shall 
not. 

Further,  by  aid  of  these  enlargements  the  whole  lake  country 
will  be  made  accessible  to  British  ships  registered  as  belonging  to 
American  owners,  and  filled  with  Canadian  iron  and  other  free  pro- 
ducts, all  of  which  raay  have  come  from  beyond  the  Atlantic.  Can  this 
be  prevented?  Assuredly  not !  Even  as  it  is,  smuggling  is  carried 
on  at  a  scale  that  is  alarming ;  but  to  what  may  it  not  be  carried 
when  every  inspector  shall  be  required  to  decide  if  iron  pigs  have 
been  the  product  of  Nova  Scotian  or  Lancashire  furnaces — whether 
tweeds  and  cottons  have  been  made  in  Canada  or  in  the  British 
islands? 

Free  transit  across  the  State  of  Maine  having  been  granted,  the 
Canadian  markets  will  be  as  well  supplied  in  the  winter  as  the 
summer  months.  British  merchandise  of  all  descriptions  will,  as 
British^  be  carried  from  Portland  to  Montreal,  to  be  thence  distrib- 
uted, as  Canadian^  throughout  the  towns  and  cities  not  only  of  the 
north  and  northwest,  but  also  of  the  south  and  southwest.  What 
then  will  become  of  the  New  York  and  Boston  trade  ?  What  can 
be  the  inducement  to  bring  merchandise  to  those  ports  when  British 
ships,  instead  of,  as  now,  coming  in  ballast,  can  come  to  Montreal 
laden  with  foreign  merchandise ;  or  when  American  railroads  can 
be  employed  in  carrying  such  merchandise  to  that  port  to  be  dis- 
tributed throughout  the  west  as  being  of  Canadian  manufacture? 
What  of  that  customs  revenue  upon  which  we  are  now  so  exclu- 
sively dependent  for  payment  of  our  annual  expenses,  interest  on 
the  debt  included?  It  is  safe  to  say  that  what,  on  the  one  hand, 
with  free  foreign  merchandise  passing  as  Canadian ;  and,  on  the 
other,  diminution  of  the  power  of  purchase  consequent  upon  de- 
struction of  our  industries,  not  one-half  will  be  collected  at  our 
custom-houses  that  is  now  received. 

Fifteen  years  since,  under  a  so-called  strictly  revenue  tariff,  our 
customs  revenues  were  but  $50,000,000  and  we  were  compelled  to 
borrow  $30,000,000  to  meet  our  regular  annual  expenditure,  in- 
cluding but  little  charge  for  interest.  Under  a  protective  tariff  we 
have  collected  more  than  $200,000,000,  and  can,  at  any  moment, 
have  it  restored  to  even  a  larger  amount.  Instead  of  this,  it  is  now 
proposed  to  give  us  a  system  that,  at  its  best,  offers  opportunities  for 
fraud  that  are  almost  boundless;  and  yet  so  clumsily  contrived  as 
almost  to  warrant  the  idea  that  it  had  been  intended  to  afford  oppor- 
tunity for  evasion  in  every  possible  shape  and  form.  That  the 
effect  of  this,  upon  the  revenue,  must  prove  most  disastrous  appears 
so  clearly  obvious  that  it  occurs  to  me,  Mr.  President,  to  suggest  the 
question  as  to  how  the  deficiencies  may  be  supplied.  Throughout 
the  war,  perfectly  free  to  determine  for  ourselves  our  course  of 


27 

action,  we  taxed  for  national  purposes  raw  materials  and  manufac- 
tured products  of  almost  every  description ;  but  by  this  treaty  we  in 
effect  declare  that  such  taxes  shall  never  be  again  imposed,  however 
great  may  prove  the  need.  If  coal  and  iron,  wool  and  cotton,  ores 
and  petroleum,  are  to  come  from  abroad  free  of  duty,  how  can  we 
tax  those  produced  at  home?  How  can  we  collect  duties  on  iron 
after  having  provided  that  iron  ships  may  be  sent  to  Canada  in 
parts,  and  there  set  up  to  be  enn ployed  in  our  coasting  or  foreign 
trade  while  but  nominally  owned  by  American  citizens?  Must  not 
the  Federal  government  almost  at  once  be  driven  to  taxes  on  the 
land,  and  on  its  various  products?  Such  taxes  being  to  the  last 
degree  unpopular,  must  not  the  effect  of  this  treaty  be  that  of  tying 
our  hands  to  such  extent  as  to  place  us  prostrate  before  that  nation 
which  everywhere  wars  upon  civilization  by  exerting  all  its  ener- 
gies for  producing  separation  of  consumers  from  producers,  the 
whole  to  be  then  treated  as  the  poor  dependents  we  must  inevi- 
tably become?  Having  by  the  treaty  of  Washington  provided 
that  neutral  rights  shall  be  so  construed  as  to  secure  to  Britain 
the  power,  as  against  ourselves,  to  war  upon  the  ocean,  are  we 
not  now  asked  so  to  act  as  to  secure  to  her  in  all  the  future 
the  power  to  make  war  upon  this  North  American  land?  The 
more,  Mr.  President,  you  shall  reflect  upon  the  facts  that  have  been 
here  presented,  the  sooner,  as  I  think,  you  will  be  led  to  see  that 
such  must  inevitably  be  the  effect  of  ratification  of  a  treaty  for 
which,  as  yet,  no  member  of  your  cabinet  has  ventured  to  make 
himself  responsible  to  you,  nor  have  you  made  yourself  so  to  your 
constituents. 

To  all  the  considerations  adverse  to  ratification  thus  far  given 
there  is  yet  one  to  be  added  that,  as  I  think,  demands  most  serious 
attention,  being  that  which  will  now  below  be  given,  as  follows: — 

Our  statutes  at  large  abound  in  treaties  providing  that  various 
nations  of  the  world  shall,  in  all  cases,  be  put  upon  the  footing  of 
"  the  most  favored  nations."  Under  the  former  treaty  with  Canada 
the  question  as  to  the  effect  of  this  provision  never  arose,  for  the 
reason  that  free  admission  was  granted  to  few,  if  even  any,  articles 
that  other  nations  desired  to  send  us.  Under  this  one  all  will  be  dif- 
ferent, France,  Germany,  Belgium,  and  other  manufacturing  nations 
claiming  to  be  put  on  the  same  precise  footing  with  the  Dominion, 
entitled  to  send  us  such  of  their  products  as  are  here  enumerated,  as 
free  from  customs  duty  as  are  those  of  Canada,  or  of  Britain.  Such 
demand  arising,  what  answer  could  be  made?  Could  it  be  that  we 
should  be  enabled  to  avoid  recognizing  the  right  thus  claimed? 
Assuming  that  it  could  not,  as  assuredly  would  be  the  case,  would 
it  not  be  a  saving  of  trouble  and  expense  to  declare  our  custom- 
houses to  have  been  altogether  closed  ? 

Having  studied  the  facts  thus  presented,  you  will,  as  I  think,  Mr. 
President,  be  prepared  to  agree  with  me  that  reversing,  as  it  cer- 
tainly  does,  the  whole  policy  of  the  Union,  this  treaty  is  the  most 
important  that  has  ever  been  submitted  to  senatorial  consideration ; 


28 

and  the  one  which  most  demanded  tliat  nothing  should  be  done 
except  in  accordance  with  the  most  approved  forms  of  diplomatic 
intercourse.  How  far  such  lias  been  the  case,  and  how  far,  in  that 
respect,  the  course  pursued  has  been  in  accordance  with  the  forms 
observed  in  reference  to  the  infinitely  less  important  treaty  of  1871, 
I  propose  to  show  in  another  letter,  meanwhile  remaining,  Mr. 
President,  Yours  very  respectfully, 

HENEY  C.  CAKEY. 
Philadelphia,  November  25,  1874. 


LETTER  EIGHTH. 

Mr.  President: — 

Absolute  secrecy  having  been  the  rule  adopted  by  the  conspira- 
tors engaged  in  revolutionizing  our  financial  and  navigation  sys- 
tems, we  were  kept  in  entire  ignorance  of  their  preliminary  move- 
ments until — as  a  consequence  of  recent  -communication  to  the 
British  Parliament  of  such  portions  of  a  correspondence  on  the 
subject  as  seemed  fit  for  publication — now  at  last  enabled  to  see  a 
little  behind  the  scenes,  learning  thence  that  on  the  23d  of  February 
last  there  occurred  to  Mr.  Brown,  and  his  colleague  Mr.  Mackenzie, 
the  "happy  thought"  that  the  then  present  was  "a  most  favorable 
opportunity  for  the  renewal  of  negotiations  for  a  reciprocity  treaty 
between  Canada  and  the  United  States  of  America,  by  which  the 
claim  for  compensation  as  regards  the  fisheries  might  be  settled 
without  the  reference  provided  for  by  Article  XXII.  of  the  Treaty 
of  Washington." 

In  what  manner,  Mr.  President,  could  this  wonderful  discovery 
have  been  made  ?  Had  there  been  any  discussion  of  the  subject  in 
our  public  press?  in  legislative  bodies?  at  public  meetings?  in 
Congress  ?  To  the  best  of  my  belief  there  had  been  nothing  of  the 
kind,  and  if  I  am  right  in  this,  as  I  certainly  think  I  am,  the  dis- 
covery of  the  fact  that  such  "  opportunity^"  had  now  arrived  must  have 
resulted  from  a  correspondence  between  officials,  north  and  south  of 
the  lakes,  that  it  has  not  yet  been  deemed  expedient  to  bring  before 
the  public  eye. 

In  all  time  past,  Mr.  President,  our  government  has  been  remark- 
able for  the  perfect  publicity  of  its  diplomatic  movements,  the 
example  which  has  thus  been  set  having  been  the  cause  of  change 
on  the  part  of  Britain,  and  of  other  European  powers.  Directly 
the  reverse,  however,  we  find  ourselves  compelled  to  look  to 
Britain  for  information  as  to  what  has  now  been  done  even  in  our 
midst,  at  Washington  itself.  May  we  not,  Mr.  President,  find  in 
this  some  evidence  that  mischief  was  on  foot;  that  something  known 
to  be  very  wrong,  if  not  even  criminal,  had  been  in  contemplation  ? 


29 

Little  more  than  a  month  later,  say  on  the  28th  of  March,  we  find 
by  their '' Memorandum"  the  British  Commissioners  to  have  been 
in  communication  with  our  Secretary  of  State,  learning  from  him 
that  he  had  "  no  communication  to  make,"  and  that  he  would  wish 
THEM  to  "indicate  the  enlargements  of  the  old  treaty  that  would  be 
likely  to  be  acceptable  to  both  countries;"  the  whole  movement 
being  still  kept  so  entirely  secret  that  no  suspicion  whatsoever  was 
entertained,  on  this  side  of  the  border,  that  any  change  in  our  com- 
mercial policy  had  even  been  suggested. 

From  that  hour  the  Secretary  seems  to  have  disappeared  wholly 
from  the  scene  until,  on  the  17th  of  June,  when  there  yet  remained 
but  five  days  of  the  session,  we  find  him  transmitting  to  you, 
Mr.  President,  the  "draught  of  a  treaty  which  British  plenipoten- 
tiaries have  proposed  to  this  government;"  thereby  indicating  that 
between  him  and  those  plenipotentiaries  there  had  been  no  negotia- 
tion whatsoever  ;  and  that,  as  has  since  been  learned  from  the  "  Memo- 
rand  urn"  itself,  he  had  left  it  entirely  to  them  to  determine  the  terms 
of  the  most  important  of  all  the  treaties  ever  proposed  between 
us  and  any  foreign  power;  that  one  by  means  of  which  "Canada 
was  to  enjoy  all  the  advantages  of  being  a  State  of  the  Union  with- 
out any  of  its  disadvantages;"  one  whose  necessary  effect  must,  to 
the  ruin  of  our  shipbuilders  and  manufacturers,  be  that  of  throwing 
the  whole  country  open  to  the  import,  free  of  duty,  of  British  ships 
and  merchandise;  and  the  only  one  that  had  ever  been  suggested  by 
which  we  were  to  be  held  bound,  hand  and  foot,  throughout  a  period 
of  time  equal  to  a  whole  generation,  say  five  and  twenty  years  ! 

Silence  had  throughout  prevailed,  nor,  Mr.  President,  was  it  broken 
until,  as  already  stated,  about  the  middle  of  May  the  public  mind 
was  startled  by  a  flight  of  literary  rockets  passing  outward  in  all 
directions,  north  and  south,  east  and  west,  from  close  neighborhood 
of  the  Treasury  building;  each  and  every  of  them  bearer  of  an  admo- 
nition to  our  people  to  the  effect,  that  if  they  would  be  prosperous 
in  the  future  they  could  be  so  only  on  the  condition  above  described, 
to  wit,  that  of  enabling  our  northern  neighbors  to  enjoy  "  all  the 
advantages  of  being  within  the  Union,"  while  freed  from  all  the 
liabilities  of  a  State;  leaving  wholly  out  of  view,  however,  the 
fact,  that  by  aid  of  preliminary  arrangements  with  Britain,  the  ports 
of  Canada,  and  through  them,  necessarily,  our  ports  on  the  lakes, 
were  practically  to  be  open  to  free  admission  of  some  of  the  most 
important  of  all  the  British  manufactures. 

The  publication  thus  made  had,  of  course,  the  efiect  of  stimu- 
lating desire  for  further  information,  application  therefor  being 
made  to  the  then  Assistant  Secretary  of  State,  with,  however, 
as  then  was  understood,  no  effect  other  than  that  of  being  enabled 
to  learn  that  the  matter  was  one  in  which  the  State  Department 
took  no  part  whatsoever;  and  that,  if  further  information  were  de- 
sired, application  must  be  made  to  its  head,  the  Secretary  himself. 
That  this  was  certainly  so  we  since  have  learned,  Mr.  President, 
from  his  own  letter  to  yourself,  transmitting  the  treaty  exactly  as 


30 

it  had   been   proposed   by  the  British   plenipotentiaries   to   your 
government. 

Curiosity  stimulating  to  exertion,  earnest  search  came  now  to 
be  made  for  the  place  in  which  the  negotiatioo  might  be  in  pro- 
gress, as  well  as  lor  the  men  by  whom  the  work  was  being  done. 
It  was,  and  most  emphatically,  a  pursuit  of  knowledge  under  diffi- 
culties; but,  earnestly  prosecuted  as  it  was,  it  resulted  in  bringing 
to  light  the  remarkable  facts,  that  the  former  had  been  discovered  in 
a  somewhat  obscure  corner  of  the  Treasury  Department,  the  latter 
there  exhibiting  themselves  in  the  persons  of  two  gentlemen,  one  of 
whom,  although  now  in  our  public  service,  was  by  birth  a  Nova 
Scotian,  the  other  being  a  bonnie  Scot ;  both  maintaining  close  re- 
lations with  that  Dominion  whose  rulers  were  now  seeking  to 
secure  for  their  fellow-subjects,  and  for  those  of  the  British  Isles, 
all  the  advantages  of  being  within  the  Union  wholly  free  from  the 
responsibilities  of  that  people  with  whom  they  thus  demanded  to 
become  commercially  allied. 

Before  proceeding  further,  allow  me  now,  Mr.  President,  to  ask 
your  attention  to  the  wonderful  difference  in  the  preliminary  ar- 
rangements for  the  treaties  of  1871  and  1874,  those  provided  for 
the  former  exhibiting  a  care  and  thoughtfulness,  and  an  array  of 
moral  and  material  force,  more  remarkable  than  anything  of  the 
kind  on  record;  wonderfully  contrasting,  too,  with  the  absolute 
unimportance,  so  far  as  we  ourselves  had  been  concerned,  of  the 
question  as  to  whether  decisions  should  be  now  arrived  at,  or  post- 
poned, even  were  it  to  be  to  the  Greek  kalends. 

Looking  now  to  the  latter,  that  of  1874,  we  find  before  us  ques- 
tions of  more  importance  than  had  ever  before  been  even  spoken 
of  by  our  diplomatists,  yet  treated  in  a  "  hole  in  the  corner" 
fashion  of  which  the  parties  have  been  themselves  so  much  ashamed 
that  no  single  person,  on  our  side  at  least,  has  ventured  to  make 
himself  responsible  for  endorsement  of  a  treaty  which  had  there 
been  dictated  by  representatives  of  Britain;  and,  to  all  appearance, 
accepted  for  us  by  nobody  beyond  a  late  subject  of  Queen  Vic- 
toria who  might,  perhaps,  within  even  the  next  half  year,  and 
wholly  without  disadvantage,  replace  himself  in  the  Dominion, 
renewing  the  oath  of  allegiance  to  his  recent  sovereign.*  The  more, 
Mr.  President,  you  shall  reflect  upon  the  contrast  thus  presented, 
the  more  must  you  be  led  to  think  that,  were  it  not  so  sad  that 

*  Of  the  persou  here  referred  to  as,  to  all  appearaiKje,  acting  in  the  capacity  o\ 
Minister  Plenipotentiary  for  the  regulation  of  our  intercourse  not  only  with  Canada 
and  Britain,  but  with  foreign  nations  generally,  the  New  York  Tribune  some  two  years 
since  spoke  as  follows  : — 

"The  International  Statistical  Congress  is  about  to  convene  at  St.  Petersburgh,  and 
it  is  not  agreeable  to  realize  that  the  Administration  could  not  find  citizens  of  the 
United  States  sufficiently  enlightened  to  serve  as  delegates,  but  must  confer  the  com- 
pliment on  a  foreigner  who  is  smart  enough  to  hold  office  and  manage  year  after  year 
to  support  his  family  at  the  public  crib,  although  he  secured  the  exemption  of  his 
son  from  military  service  during  the  late  rebellion,  by  making  oath  that  he  was  a 
foreigner." 


81 

public  affairs  should  be  thus  conducted,  the  whole  thing  would  ap- 
pear ridiculous  beyond  all  diplomatic  precedent. 

By  whom,  Mr.  President,  had  this  gentleman  been  appointed  to 
so  responsible  a  position  ?  That  it  was  not  by  yourself  may  be 
regarded  as  absolutely  certain.  That  it  was  not  by  your  Secretary 
of  State  is  equally  so,  he  having  left  the  whole  arrangement  of 
this  important  matter  to  the  Commissioners.  Such  having  been  the 
case,  our  very  extraordinary  representative  on  this  occasion  would 
seem  to  have  been  a  mere  volunteer;  and  yet,  there  was,  perhaps, 
no  single  person  in  the  public  service  the  nature  of  whose  relations 
with  the  Dominion  could  by  any  possibility  have  been  regarded  as 
so  absolutely  disqualifying  him  for  the  important  duties  for  whose 
performance  he  thus  had  volunteered. 

The  other  negotiator,  the  Hon.  Mr.  Brown,  is  editor  of  a  public 
journal,  an  active,  and  by  many  regarded  as  an  unscrupulous, 
politician,  exercising  much  influence  in  the  Colonial  government, 
and  having,  as  is  well  understood  in  Canada,  absolute  control  of  that 
secret  service  fund  which  proved  so  largely  useful  on  occasion  of 
the  negotiation  and  ratification  of  the  treaty  of  1854;  at  which  time 
its  lavish  application  under  the  direction  of  Mr.,  now  Sir  Francis, 
Hincks,  then  regarded  as  corruptionist  general,  was  so  thoroughly 
•understood  both  at  Washington  and  at  Toronto,  and  so  bitterly  de- 
nounced by  Canadian  journals  of  the  day;  most  especially,  too, 
if  my  memory  serves  me  rightly,  by  the  I'oronto  Globe,  of  which  the 
honorable  Commissioner  has  now,  and  may  possibly  then  have  had, 
the  entire  management.* 

Behind  this  secret  service  fund  there  are,  however,  interests  of 
great  importance,  represented  by  men  who  well  know  that,  because 
of  the  protection  secured  to  our  farmers,  our  manufacturers,  and  our 
working  people  generally,  they  themselves  are  compelled  annually 
to  pay  into  our  treasury  many  millions;  and  further,  that  if  they 
can  succeed  in  breaking  down  that  fence  by  whose  means  our  in- 
terests are  protected,  those  millions  will  be  retained  by  themselves, 
to  their  own  great  profit.  Such  being  the  case,  need  we  wonder 
that  some  of  the  very  wealthy  among  them  should  have  pledged 
themselves,  as  they  are  understood  to  have  done,  for  large  sums  to 
be,  if  needed,  added  to  the  corruption  fund? 

This  Treaty  however,  as  has  been  shown,  is  a  British,  and  not  a 
Canadian  one,  and  it  is  to  Britain  herself  that  those  who  are  urging 
it  on  must  mainly  look  for  help.     To  what  extent  it  may  probably 

*  "That  system  was  introduced  by  Mr.  Hincks.  It  commenced  by  an  expenditure  of 
some  fifty  thousand  dollars.  It  went  on  growing  and  expandinoj  every  year,  after 
the  Treaty  was  in  force,  for  the  last  ten  years.  And  half  the  so-called  claims  of 
those  who  lent  their  influence  to  get  the  Treaty  passed,  are  not  paid  to-day. 

"Mr.  Hincks  was  of  the  opinion  that  some  of  those  who  got  most  of  the  first  outlay 
of  money,  in  the  neighborhood  of  Washington,  did  the  most  to  obstruct  the  passage 
of  the  Treaty,  so  that  they  might  keep  up  the  yearly  supply  of  subsidies.  This  may 
have  been  an  unjust  and  uncharitable  judgment,  but  it  was  one  held  very  decidedly 
and  firmly  by  Mr.  Hincks." — Scottish  American  Journal^  July  20,  1865. 


32 

be  obtained  will  be  appreciated  by  tliose  who  shall  peruse  with 
care  a  parliamentary  report  here  given,  as  follows: — 

"The  laboring  classes  generally  in  the  manufacturing  districts  of  the  kingdom, 
and  especially  in  the  iron  and  coal  districts,  are  very  little  aware  of  the  extent  to 
which  they  are  often  indebted  for  their  being  employed  at  all  to  the  immense 
losses  which  their  employers  voluntarily  incur  in  bad  times,  in  order  to  destroy 
foreign  competition,  and  to  gain  and  keep  possession  of  foreign  markets.  Au- 
thentic instances  are  well  known  of  employers  having  in  such  times  carried  on 
their  works  at  a  loss  amounting  in  the  aggregate  to  £300,000  or  £400,000  in  the 
course  of  three  or  four  years.  If  the  efforts  of  those  who  encourage  the  combina- 
tions to  restrict  the  amount  of  labor  and  to  produce  strikes  were  to  be  successful 
for  any  length  of  time,  the  great  accumulations  of  capital  could  no  longer  be  made 
which  enable  a  few  of  the  most  wealthy  capitalists  to  overwhelm  all  foreign  com- 
petition in  times  of  great  depression,  and  thus  to  clear  the  way  for  the  whole  trade 
to  step  in  when  prices  revive,  and  to  carry  a  great  business  before  foreign  capital 
can  again  accumulate  to  such  an  extent  as  to  be  able  to  establish  a  competition 
in  prices  with  any  chance  of  success.  The  large  cajntals  of  this  country  are  the 
great  instruments  of  luarfare  against  the  competing  capilaU  of  foreign  countries, 
and  are  the  most  essential  instruments  now  remaining  by  ivhirh  our  manufactur- 
ing supremacy  can  he  maiiUained  ;  the  other  elements — cheap  labor,  abundance 
of  raw  materials,  means  of  communication,  and  skilled  labor — being  rapidly  in 
process  of  being  equalized." 

The  war,  Mr.  President,  thus  indicated,  is  now  being  carried  on 
under  the  guise  of  friendship,  and  is  a  thousand  times  more  to  be 
feared  than  any  one  which  might  avail  itself  of  the  services  of  the 
rifle  and  the  mitrailleuse. 

In  some  manner  interested  as  partner  in  the  management  of  the 
extraordinary  combination  above  described,  and  whose  secrets 
have  generally  been  so  well  preserved,  we  find  a  gentleman  well 
known  in  Washington  circles  as  manager  of  schemes  for  whose 
promotion  champagne  and  gold  may  advantageously  be  dispensed ; 
and  as  being  himself,  upon  occasion,  giver  of  entertainments  made 
profitable  to  both- host  and  guests.  Had  you,  Mr.  President,  your- 
self unseen,  been  present  on  some  of  those  occasions,  you  might 
perhaps  have  heard  the  questions — "Have  you  seen  Brown?  Will 
you  see  him  ?  Might  you  not  as  well  make  a  few  thousand  dollars?" 
— these  questions  followed  up  by  remarks  to  the  effect  that,  "being 
backed  by  millions,  we  shall  certainly  put  it  through  the  Senate." 
Of  all  this  the  general  result  must  inevitably  have  been  the  produc- 
tion in  your  mind,  Mr.  President,  of  a  conviction  that  money  had 
been  used,  and  to  an  extent  hitherto  unknown,  for  the  purpose  of 
carrying  into  practical  effect  a  grand  conspiracy  against  the  peace, 
prosperity,  and  honor  of  both  the  American  people  and  their  State. 

"Can  it  be  possible,"  it  may  here  be  asked,  "that  the  Commis- 
sioners could,  in  any  manner,  be  cognizant  of  such  transactions?" 
For  answer  I  need  but  say,  that  nothing  could  have  been  more 
disgraceful  that  what  was  so  well  known,  in  both  Washington  and 
Toronto,  to  have  occurred  in  1854;  and  that  the  present  Commis- 
sioners cannot  be  supposed  to  be  greatly  more  virtuous  than  Lord 
Elgin  then  was ;  or  than  those  men  are  by  whom  Britain  is  now 
represented  in  the  various  countries  of  the  East,  among  whom,  as, 


33 

Mr.  President,  has  been  shown,  there  is  a  perpetual  exhibition  of 
unscrupulousness  as  to  the  measures  to  be  used  when  maintenance 
or  extension  of  the  British  power  is  brought  into  question.  What 
is  now  being  done  in  Japan  is  infinitely  worse  than  what  is  being 
attempted  here.  Nevertheless,  the  men,  abroad  and  at  home,  by 
whom  such  things  are  done  would  be  shocked  on  being  told  that 
their  conduct  was,  as  certainly  is  the  case,  unworthy  of  gentlemen. 

Of  all  the  communities  of  the  world  there  is  none  in  which  it  is 
so  fully  recognized  that  '*  the  smuggler" — that  is,  the  man  who  lives 
by  violation  of  the  laws  of  his  own  or  of  neighboring  countries — 
"is  the  great  reformer  of  the  age;"  none  by  which,  in  treating  with 
other  nations,  the  Jesuit  maxim,  that  "  the  end  sanctifies  the  means," 
is  so  fully  and  distinctly  adopted.  If,  then,  these  Commissioners 
have  done  that  with  which  public  opinion  now  so  generally  charges 
them,  they  have  but  acted  in  full  accordance  with  that  political  faith 
in  which  they  have  been  educated;  and  which,  as  yet,  the  Cobden 
Club,  of  which  they  are  understood  to  be  members,  has  not  in  any 
manner  repudiated. 

The  men  who  by  aid  of  champagne  and  gold  engineered  to  final 
ratification  the  treaty  of  1854,  made  free  use  of  the  name  of 
"  Hincks,"  and  the  British  government  subsequently  signified  its 
approval  of  his  conduct,  on  that  and  other  occasions,  by  gazetting 
him  to  a  baronetcy,  and  appointing  him  to  the  Governorship  of 
Demerara,  with  a  salary  equal  to  that  then  paid,  Mr.  President,  to 
your  predecessors.  Those  who  are  now  engineering  this  infamous 
sacrifice  of  all  American  interests,  make  equally  free  use  of  the 
name  of  "Brown,"  and  it  is  well  understood  in  Canada  that  success 
in  the  work  in  which  he  is  now  employed  is  to  be  rewarded  by 
enabling  him  to  take  his  place  beside  Sir  Francis  Hincks  and  the 
Marquis  of  Ripon,  each  and  all  having  been  indebted  for  promotion 
to  the  skill  evinced  in  obtaining  from  us  grants  of  inestimable  value, 
giving  nothing  in  return. 

Admitting  now,  Mr.  President,  that  on  the  thorough  examination 
of  this  matter  which,  as  it  may  be  hoped,  will  now  be  had,  it  should 
be  clearly  established  that  the  warrant  of  the  present  agents  for 
using  the  word  "Brown"  is  fully  equal  to  that  of  the  former  for  so 
using  that  of  "Hincks,"  what  is  the  position  in  which  these  Com- 
missioners will  then  be  placed?  Seeking  an  answer  to  this  ques- 
tion, and  studying  the  laws  of  diplomatic  intercourse,  we  learn  that 
that  of  foreign  ministers,  in  reference  to  public  affairs,  is  limited  to 
the  government  alone ;  and  that  any  departure  from  this  salutary 
rule  constitutes  an  offence  meriting  reprimand  from  the  govern- 
ment represented,  as  well  as  from  that  to  which  the  party  has  been 
accredited.  So  thoroughly  is  this  understood  among  civilized  com- 
munities, that  not  even  the  smallest  of  those  of  Europe  would  for  a 
moment  tolerate  such  interference  between  it  and  its  subjects  as  is 
believed  here  to  have  taken  place.  What  in  this  respect  had  been 
the  action  of  your  predecessors,  Mr.  President,  is  shown  in  the  case 
of  M.  Genet,  in  the  days  of  Washington ;  of  Mr.  Jackson,  in  those 
3 


34 

of  Madison  ;  and  of  Mr.  Crarapton,  in  those  of  President  Pierce ;  the 
two  former  having  been  promptly  dismissed  for  having  ventured  to 
appeal  to  the  people  against  the  government,  and  the  last  for  having 
ventured  to  enlist  soldiers  for  service  in  the  Crimean  war.  Study- 
ing now  these  several  cases,  we  find  them  all  to  have  been  greatly 
less  objectionable  than  the  one  here  presented  for  consideration  ;  the 
parties  to  the  former  having,  with  possibly  some  exception  in  the 
Crampton  case,  worked  in  the  broad  light  of  day,  thereby  enabling 
the  government  to  understand  their  true  position ;  those  who  have 
now  so  freely  used  the  Commissioners'  names  having  throughout 
carried  into  effect  what  is  known  in  Canada  as  the  "Ilincks 
System;"  working  so  entirely  in  the  dark  that  you,  Mr.  President, 
although  directly  on  the  spot,  have  been  kept  in  entire  ignorance  of 
the  fact  that  hundreds  of  thousands  of  dollars  are  believed  to  have 
been  employed  in  the  purchase  of  public  opinion  within  and  without 
the  halls  of  Congress.  The  one  might  be  regarded  as  frank  and 
open  war ;  the  other,  under  the  guise  of  friendship,  as  plainly  and 
simply  the  purchase  of  treason  to  the  people  and  the  Stajte.  If  the 
one  demanded,  as  it  certainly  did,  prompt  dismissal,  would  not  the 
other,  on  the  relation  of  principal  and  agent  being  conclusively 
established,  demand  not  only  instant  dismissal,  but  also  apology 
from  the  government  that  had  allowed  itself  to  have  been  so  greatly 
misrepresented?  Firmly  believing  that  careful  investigation  would 
prove  that  such  had  certainly  been  the  case,  and  that  the  facts  have 
been  throughout  as  they  above  are  given, 

I  remain,  Mr.  President,  yours,  very  respectfully, 

HENEY  C.  CABEY. 
November  26, 1874. 


LETTER  NINTH. 


Mr.  President  :  The  machinery  having  been  thus  exhibited  by 
aid  of  which  this  remarkable  treaty  was  to  be  concocted,  we  may 
now  examine  how  it  has  been  made  to  work,  as-  follows  : — 

From  and  after  the  revocation  of  treaty  privileges,  in  1866,  their 
re-establishment  became  to  so  great  an  extent  the  leading  idea  in 
Canadian  minds  that  it  may  be  doubted  if  at  any  subsequent  session 
of  Congress  the  Dominion  has  failed  to  be  represented  in  its  halls 
by  agents  charged  with  study  of  the  ground,  to  the  end  of  carrying 
into  practical  effect  the  idea  so  generally  prevalent  beyond  the  lakes. 
When,  then,  our  Secretary  of  State,  in  March  last,  referred  the 
whole  question  to  Commissioners,  representing  both  Canada  and 
Britain,  fully  impregnated  with  the  "  happy  thought"  of  selling 
once  again  the  "  priceless"  fisheries  at  greatly  more  than  their  real 
value,  these  latter  so  fully  understood  what  it  was  that  they  desired 
to  eff'ect,  that  they  could  without  difficulty  have  furnished  a  treaty, 


35 

fully  and  completely  mounted,  within  the  space  of  eight  and  forty 
hours.  Nevertheless,  nothing  of  the  kind  was  done,  more  than  as 
many  days  having  been  required  for  bringing  about  a  state  of  things 
by  means  of  which  an  apparent  public  opinion  favorable  to  accom- 
plishment of  their  purposes  could  be  created.  How  that  was 
done,  between  the  6th  and  20th  of  May,  has  been  already  shown, 
and  that  it  must  have  required  considerable  expenditure,  must  now, 
Mr.  President,  be  clearly  obvious  to  all  who  have  studied  the  facts 
which  have  above  been  given. 

A  fortnight  later  came  the  news  that  a  treaty  was  already  "  before 
the  Senate ;"  not  as  yet,  as  we  then  were  told,  submitted  for  ratifica- 
tion, but  only  with  a  view  to  obtaining  the  advice  of  that  body  in 
reference  thereto ;  and  yet,  by  many  senators  it  was,  and  most  truly 
so  far  as  their  information  went,  positively  denied  that  any  such 
document  had  been  communicated  to  the  senatorial  body.  An  ab- 
stract thereof,  however,  given,  as  has  been  shown,  on  the  6th  of 
June,  by  the  New  York  Tribune^  having  furnished  proof  that  an 
onslaught  on  our  shipping  and  manufacturing  interests  was  in 
preparation,  there  occurred  to  its  negotiators  the  "happy  thought" 
that  by  making  a  show  of  application  for  information  as  to  how  our 
various  industries  were  likely  to  be  affected  by  such  a  measure  as 
that  proposed,  the  whole  proceeding  might  be  made  more  pleasing 
to  the  public  eye. 

To  that  end  letters  were  sent  out,  but  by  what  authority  beyond 
that  of  the  treasury  clerk  who  signed  them  remains  as  yet  un- 
known, asking  information  as  to  whether  Canadian  interference  was 
in  any  manner  to  be  apprehended ;  suppressing  altogether  the  fact 
that  the  Dominion  had  given  to  the  British  authorities  assurance 
that  all  goods  similar  to  those  which  were  to  be  now  admitted  free 
from  here  would  be  so  admitted  coming  direct  from  the  British 
isles ;  as  also,  the  further  fact,  of  greatly  more  importance,  that, 
in  strict  accordance  with  the  wording  of  the  treaty,  our  ports  would 
practically  be  opened  for  the  free  admission  of  a  large  proportion 
of  the  British  manufactures,  ships  included.  Intended  for  decep- 
tion of  their  recipients,  these  letters  had  the  effect  anticipated, 
to  wit,  that  in  their  entire  ignorance  of  the  real  facts  many 
answered  that  they  saw  little  objection  to  what  had  been  proposed; 
those  answers  being  now,  as  it  is  understood,  held  ready  for  pro- 
duction by  the  negotiators — one  a.  resident,  the  other  a  native,  of 
the  Dominion — as  evidence,  full  and  complete,  that  our  manufac- 
turers have  really  nothing  to  fear,  if  not  even  much  to  hope,  from 
ratification  of  a  treaty  every  line  of  which,  as  is  shown  by  their 
own  "Memorandum,"  had  been  allowed  to  be  dictated  by  the  Com- 
missioners, without,  so  far  as  can  be  seen,  even  a  shadow  of  objec- 
tion on  our  part.  i) 

Need  we  now  wonder,  Mr.  President,  that  such  letters  should, 
upon  occasion,  have  been  accompanied  by  suggestions  to  the  effect 
that  their  contents  were  not  to  be  made  known  to  editors  of  pro- 
tectionist proclivities?     Certainly  not!     One  such  I  myself  have 


86 

seen.  How  many  more  there  may  have  been  I  cannot  pretend  to 
guess ;  but  am  certainly  of  opinion  that  the  emission  of  even  a  single 
one,  with  the  signature  of  a  government  employ^,  is  an  offence  that 
should  not  be  allowed  to  pass  unnoticed. 

By  the  "Memorandum"  of  the  Comnnissioners  sent  to  the  Senate 
on  or  about  the  5th  of  June,  it  was  proposed  that  "  animals  and 
their  products,  products  of  the  farm,  the  forest,  the  mine,  and  the 
ocean ;  dyestuffs,  manure,  and  rags ;"  should  be  admitted  free  ; 
these  pwpositions  being  followed  up  by  suggestions  to  the  eft'ect  that 
ships  of  the  Dominion  should  be  placed  on  an  equality  with  our 
own ;  that  several  descriptions  of  manufactures  should,  on  both 
sides,  be  so  admitted  ;  and  that  various  arrangements  relative  to 
the  St.  Lawrence,  to  canals  north  and  south  of  the  line,  and  to 
lighthouses,  should  be  incorporated  into  the  treaty  now  proposed. 

To  whom,  Mr.  President,  could  these  propositions,  and  these  sug- 
gestions, have  been  made?  Not,  certainly,  to  your  Secretary  of 
State,  he  having  not  only  declined  to  make  any  "  propositions" 
whatsoever,  but  having  since  distinctly  stated  that  he  held  himself 
in  no  manner  responsible  for  any  portion  of  the  treaty  now  before 
ns.  To  whom,  then?  Not  certainly  to  your  Finance  Minister,  he 
having,  even  in  a  case  like  this,  where  all  his  calculations  were 
so  liable  to  be  set  at  naught,  no  authority  to  enter  into  nego- 
tiations with  any  foreign  minister  whatsoever.  Outside  of  these 
there  could  be  no  one  to  whom  they  could  honestly  be  made ;  and 
yet,  within  a  fortnight  we  find  that  not  only  had  they  all,  both 
"  propositions"  and  "  suggestions,"  been  accepted,  but  that  thereto 
had  been  added  "  lead  and  leather,  paper  and  paper-making  ma- 
chinery, printing  type,  stereotypes,  carriages,  railroad  cars,  steam 
engines,  mill  machinery,  locomotives,  tweeds,  satinets,"  and  various 
other  commodities  that  had  been  neither  proposed  nor  suggested 
when,  but  ten  days  previously,  the  Commissioners  had  felt  that  it 
might  be  possible  so  far  to  trespass  on  the  credulity  of  our  people 
as  to  cause  ultimate  failure  of  a  scheme  whose  success  thus  far  had 
obviously  far  transcended  their  expectations. 

By  whom,  then,  on  our  side,  had  this  work  of  acceptance  been 
perpetrated  ?  So  far  as  can  be  seen,  Mr.  President,  there  has  been 
none  beyond  that  same  treasury  clerk  to  whom  the  Commissioners 
acknowledge  their  indebtedness  for  figures  that,  as  presented  in  their 
"  Memorandum,"  could  have  been  arranged  for  no  purpose  other 
than  that  of  mystifying  such  Senators  as  were  permitted  to  see  the 
document  in  which  they  subsequently  were  given ;  that  one  who, 
in  the  few  days  allowed  to  elapse  between  presentation  of  the 
'*  Memorandum"  and  conclusion  of  the  treaty,  professed  to  seek 
among  our  manufacturers  for  information,  while  concealing  most 
important  facts;  and  that  one  who,  without  authority  of  any  kind 
that  can  be  now  perceived,  has  negotiated  the  most  important 
treaty  ever  submitted  to  the  Senate  for  consideration ;  not  only 
revolutionizing,  as  it  does,  our  financial  and  navigation  systems, 
but  so  binding  ourselves  to  a  foreign   nation  as  to  deprive  our 


87 

successors,  throughout  a  whole  generation,  of  all  power  for  cor- 
rection I 

The  Japanese  nation  bound  itself  for  ten  years,  but  now  finds 
itself  to  have  lost  all  control  over  its  own  actions,  having,  in  effect, 
bound  itself  forever.  Let  this  treaty  be  ratified  and  it  will  be  found 
that  we,  in  like  manner,  shall  have  hou7id  ourselves  forever. 

Pausing  now  for  a  moment  in  the  history  of  this  extraordinary 
transaction,  allow  me,  Mr.  President,  to  call  your  attention  to  the 
fraud  involved  in  furnishing,  for  senatorial  use,  a  document  to  be 
accepted  as  giving,  in  their  full  extent,  the  demands  made  upon 
us  with  a  view  to  prevent  that  "feeling  of  dissatisfaction"  which 
might  arise  "  if  the  large  value  placed  by  the  Canadian  people  on 
their  fisheries  were  not  reasonably  compensated ;"  and  then,  with 
the  session  so  near  its  close  that  but  five  working  days  yet  remained, 
furnishing  to  our  Secretary  a  document  containing  further  demands 
of  great  importance,  without,  so  far  as  can  be  now  discovered,  even 
a  word  as  to  the  additions  which  had  thus  been  made. 

On  or  before  the  16th  of  June,  just  ten  days  from  the  publication 
by  the  Tribune  of  the  contents  of  a  confidential,  memorandum  pre- 
pared for  the  mystification  of  Senators,  and  from  which  had  been 
excluded  very  much  that  seems  subsequently  to  have  been  sur- 
reptitiously introduced,  the  treaty,  "  armed  all  in  proof,"  must 
have  been  placed,  Mr.  President,  in  the  hands  of  your  Secretary  of 
State.  On  the  17th,  as  has  been  shown,  it  was  forwarded  by  him  to 
you  without  a  suggestion  to  the  effect  that  he  had  even  sought  to 
master  its  contents.  On  the  18th,  relying  upon  him  as  your  con- 
stitutional adviser  in  all  such  matters,  it  was  forwarded  by  you  to 
the  Senate,  accompanied  by  a  message  in  which  you  in  like  manner 
disclaimed  responsibility  for  it.  On  the  19th  it  was  read  by  its  title, 
and  referred.  On  the  20th,  without  the  slightest  knowledge  of  its 
contents  on  the  part  of  the  farmers,  miners,  mechanics,  manufac- 
turers, ship-builders,  and  ship  owners  of  the  Union,  it  was  meant 
by  the  conspirators  that  it  should  be  enacted  into  law,  Senators 
having  been  publicly  notified  that,  in  the  event  of  their  failing  to 
perform  that  important  duty,  you,  Mr.  President,  would  compel 
their  presence  in  extra  session,  to  their  great  annoyance  and  their 
heavy  cost.  Happily,  the  scheme  failed  in  all  its  parts,  the  aspect  of 
the  Senate  on  that  day  having  alarmed  the  conspirators  ;  and  you, 
Mr.  President,  having  refused  to  become  party  to  any  such  attempt 
to  force  upon  the  country  a  treaty  so  important  and  so  entirely  un- 
considered. With  Monday,  the  day  assigned  for  adjournment,  came 
the  lifting  of  the  veil,  the  Tribune  having  made  public  the  whole 
text  of  a  treaty  whose  real  character  had  been  meant  to  be  con- 
cealed until  ratification  had  been  accomplished  ;  and  until  we  should 
thus  have  bound  ourselves  for  five  and  twenty  years  to  the  wheels 
of  the  British  chariot,  to  be  ridden  over  at  the  pleasure  of  those  who 
are  now,  in  Japan,  engaged  in  adding  a  new  and  important  chapter 
to  the  already  most  discreditable  history  of  treaty-making  by  the 
British  people  and  their  government. 


38 

Such,  Mr.  President,  is,  as  I  believe,  a  true  account  of  a  con- 
spiracy that  has  no  parallel  in  our  history;  if,  indeed,  in  any  other. 
Recommending  it  to  your  careful  consideration,  and  hoping  that 
the  conduct  of  all  concerned  therein  may  be  made  to  undergo  a 
thorough  examination,  I  remain,  with  many  apologies  for  my  re- 
peated trespasses  on  your  time  and  attention, 

Yours  very  respectfully, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 
Philadelphia,  Nov.  27, 1874. 


ivil86262 


THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  CAUFORNIA  UBRARY 


